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(Last Modified On 2/10/2017)
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Acceptance
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Accepted
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(Last Modified On 2/15/2017)
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Description:
Plants large, 450–750 mm high, solitary, with brown, partly fibrous cataphylls. Corm ca. 20 mm diam.; tunics coarse, of pale or occasionally dark fibers. Stem unbranched, bearing 2–3(4) green sheathing leaves, usually widely spaced but occasionally overlapping. Foliage leaf solitary, linear, shortly exceeding stem, channeled to almost plane, 4–12 mm wide, inserted near base but often up to 100 mm above ground. Rhipidia solitary; spathes green with brown tips; inner 90–150 mm long, outer ca. 2/3 as long. Flowers yellow; outer tepals (50–)60–75(–100) mm long, limbs 30–50 mm long, spreading; inner tepals erect, lanceolate and sharply acute, 45–70 mm long. Filaments 11–16 mm long, free in upper 1/3; anthers 10–14 mm long. Ovary usually exserted, 15–25 mm long; style branches 17–25 mm long, crests 10–17 mm long. Capsules and seeds not known. Flowering time: late November to February (March).
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Country:
Angola, Zambia, Tanzania, Congo (DR), Malawi
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Distribution and ecology:
extending from eastern Angola and northern and western Zambia, to Congo (DR), Tanzania, Malawi, and central Mozambique; in grassland and open bush, occasionally in damper situations.
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Diagnosis:
one of the taller species of Moraea, M. verdickii has particularly large flowers, the outer tepals mostly 60–75 mm long. Although recognized as early as 1902 it was in the past included as in M. ventricosa in herbaria, and most recently was included in that species in accounts of Moraea in M. ventricosa for Congo (DR). As here circumscribed, M. verdickii is distinguished from its close allies by its large, consistently yellow flower with the outer tepals ranging from (50–)60–100 mm long and anthers 10–14 mm long; few bract leaves, generally 2 or 3; its habitat, grassland and open bush; and its early flowering, from late November to February, occasionally until March. M. macrantha has similar large flowers which are always dark blue, has 4–5 sheathing leaves, and flowers later, from mid February to July. M. ventricosa has smaller, blue or white flowers, 3–6 sheathing leaves, grows in wet situations, and flowers from February to May. M. textilis has either yellow or blue flowers, generally has 5–7 sheathing leaves, and reaches peak flowering in May.
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Specimens whose coordinates are enclosed in square brackets [ ] have been mapped to a standard reference mark based on political
units.
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Africa & Madagascar
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Tanzania
Iringa, Makete:
2600 m,
09°04'00"S 033°51'00"E,
02 March 1986,
G. Sally Bidgood & T.C.E. Congdon 137
(K)
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Tanzania
Iringa, Makete:
2600 m,
09°04'00"S 033°51'00"E,
02 March 1986,
G. Sally Bidgood & T.C.E. Congdon 137
(MO)
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Tanzania
Iringa, Mufindi:
1900 m,
08°14'15"S 035°42'43"E,
16 February 2001,
Wiland, Justyna & Emanuel I. Mboya 98
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