Aloe ferox
species of plant
Aloe ferox, commonly known as bitter aloe, is a species of flowering plant in the family Asphodelaceae. This woody aloe is indigenous to southern Africa.
It is one of several Aloe species used to make bitter aloes, a purgative medication, and also yields a non-bitter gel that can be used in cosmetics.
Description
Aloe ferox is a tall, single-stemmed aloe, that can grow to 10 feet (3.0 m) in height. Its leaves are thick and fleshy, arranged in rosettes, and have reddish-brown spines on the margins with smaller spines on the upper and lower surfaces. The leaf surfaces of young plants are covered in spines; however, as they get taller and less vulnerable to grazing, the leaves begin to lose most of their spines except for those along the leaf margins. Plants in the western part of its natural range tend to keep more of their leaf surface spines.
Its flowers are a uniform orange or red, and stand between 2 and 4 feet (0.61 and 1.22 m) above the leaves, in multi-branched inflorescences.
It is a variable species, and plants may differ physically from area to area, due to local conditions. This aloe is frequently confused with the related Aloe excelsa species, to the north, and they do look very similar when fully grown.
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This entry incorporates text from “Aloe ferox” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.