Streptocarpus nimbicola is named after its high altitude habitat on Mount Mulanje, the highest peak in Malawi. ‘Nimbicola’ means a ‘cloud-dweller’ and that it certainly is as the high Mulanje Mountain is often covered in clouds. Its characteristic pleated leaves regrow each year from the bases they die back to, so it is truly perennial. The flowers have a striking shape which can be classified as ‘keyhole’ but the corolla lobes are placed in a unique very attractive way. This was the reason why a picture of the flowers of this species were used as a frontispiece (opening photograph) of the highly authoritative book on Streptocarpus to this day by Hilliard and Burtt, published in 1971.
Streptocarpus nimbicola
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