Aloe leptosiphon – A short-shrubby clustering species to 2 feet tall with rosettes of broad based foot long lanceolate light green colored leaves with lighter teeth and getting a nice blush of red color in winter. In late spring through summer and into fall appear the bright yellow green tipped flowers that age to light orange on 18 inch long simple or few branched racemes.
Plant in full sun in a well-drained soil and irrigate occasionally to infrequently. We have not had this plant over a particularly cold winter but it has not been damages in nighttime temperatures just below freezing and others claim it hardy to around 25° F. An attractive fairly rare aloe.
Aloe leptosiphon is endemic to a limited area of north-east Tanzania where it can be found growing in grassy areas on rocky slopes in the Usambara Mountains near the town of Lushoto. The name Aloe comes from ancient Greek name aloe that was derived from the Arabian word 'alloch' that was used to describe the plant or its juice that was used as medicine and the epithet comes from the Greek words 'leptos' meaning "fine" or "delicate" and 'siphon' meaning "tube" in reference to the narrow perianth tube.
We first heard about this Aloe in a talk given by Tom Cole of Cold Springs Aloes in 2012 for the Santa Barbara Cactus and Succent Society when he spoke about both red and yellow flowe forms of this plant growing in the Usambara Mountains. We received our stock of it from John Miller at the Institute for Aloe Studies in 2017 as IAS 17-012c. The second image courtesy of Tom Cole.
The information about Aloe leptosiphon displayed on this web page is based on our research conducted in the nursery's horticultural library and from reliable online resources. We also include observations made about it as it grows in our nursery gardens and other gardens we have visited, as well how the crops have performed in containers in our nursery field. We will also incorporate comments we receive from others and welcome hearing from anyone with additional information, particularly if they can share cultural information that would aid others in growing this plant. |