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SANSEVIERIA ADVENTURE IN LAS VEGAS

SANSEVIERIA ADVENTURE IN LAS VEGAS

On Friday of the Las Vegas CSSA convention, Lee Miller and I visited the
collection of local grower and club member Dave Turner He has a rather
impressive collection of succulent plants including a comprehensive
Sansevieria collection. He told us that Juan had gone through his
collection some time ago and helped identify his plants. Many
identification mysteries were solved for him thanks to Juan's extensive
knowledge of Sansevierias.

It also helped clear up some mysteries for me and brought a couple more to
my attention.

The plant known as Sansevieria 'Malawi' is the same as the one in the trade
under the Grigsby collection number GC 126-78. It is definitely not
synonymous with Sans.patens despite what was implied in my informal species
list. The leaves are the same color, texture and channeled like Sans.patens
but obviously differs by having rigid spiraled leaves with a sharp apical
spine and long above ground runners. It does appear to belong to the
Sans.pearsonii group but is quite unique. It is very different from
Sans.gracilis of the Sans.suffruticosa group. The origin of Sans.patens
remains a mystery.

Sansevieria sp. Malawi (GC 126-78) HBG 61017
syn. Sansevieria aff. gracilis in Thiede, Sansevieria Journ. 2 (2): 29-31,
fig. 2 (1993) See also: Hargreaves, Cact. & Succ. Journ. Amer. 47
(supplement): 90, figs. 19-20 (1975)) Malawi

Sansevieria patens N.E. Brown, Kew Bulletin 1915 (5): 30-31, fig 5A-B
(1915)

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Dave also told us that a group from the Hawaiian CSSA club, including
Nathan Wong, had been to his greenhouse the day before and vehemently
insisted that the plant commonly called Sanseviera 'Koko' did not originate
from Koko Crater in Hawaii.  He said they insisted that it came from some
place in Kenya called Koko.

The account in The Sansevieria Journal 4 (2): 67, fig. 3  (1995) tells a
different story: "Nathan Wong, who is the Curator of Koko Gardens, said "I
had gotten a quite unusual distichous Sansevieria with red-edged
cylindrical leaves from Ed [Eby] called "Koko". It is an unidentified
species that someone labeled "Koko" for the Koko Crater Botanical Gardens.
Recently, Juan (our distinguished editor) indicated that he had seen
similar plants with collection data from Kenya."

Sans. 'Koko' appears to be somewhat similar to Sans.eilensis Chahinian but
much more robust with more numerous and longer leaves and inflorescence
more in the direction of Sans. pearsonii N.E. Brown.

Does Juan or anyone else have any further information on the origins of
this mysterious plant?

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Dave is interested in plants of Sans.eilensis and Sans.sambiranensis to buy
or trade. You can reach him at turner-greenhouse@worldnet.att.net.

Cereusly Steve
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