Caudex Plant Encyclopedia

The African baobab of the savanna, famous for its massive bottle-shaped trunk. Seedlings have simple leaves that change with age to palmate leaves of five to seven leaflets, and young plants can be kept in pots for many years.

A ponytail-palm relative endemic to Mexico's Tehuacán Valley, raising several slender stems from a huge corky base like an elephant's foot. Unlike B. recurvata, its narrow, strongly blue-grey leaves stand stiffly upright.

Known as Ponytail Palm, with a swollen trunk base and cascading leaves.

A small caudex that self-pollinates and shoots seeds, easy to grow from seed for beginners.

A small Madagascan spurge that spreads by creeping rhizomes and bears rosettes of leaves at the stem tips. Its dark red to green leaves are strongly wavy and crisped, turning coppery in summer.

A small southern African spurge whose twisting tuberous caudex sends up many slender three- to four-angled branches striped grey-green. Tough and easy to root from cuttings, it is a good first caudiciform Euphorbia.

Known as Martian Plant in Japan, with a potato-like caudex producing climbing vines.

A cucurbit with large spherical green caudex producing vines, fast-growing and impressive.

A Mexican cucurbit caudex with large green tuber producing vines, hardy for beginners.

A spurge-family caudiciform from Texas and north-eastern Mexico with a pale, globe-shaped caudex and grey-green leaves deeply cut into five to seven lobes. Bright pink to poppy-red flowers appear throughout the growing season.

Known as Gout Plant, with red flowers and a plump trunk from Central-South America.

Known in Japan as Hakubajo. A southern African Pachypodium whose ball-shaped base sends up densely spiny branches and bears large white flowers flushed purple in autumn. It is easy and relatively fast-growing.

The "Madagascar ocotillo" of the southern spiny forest, with bone-white stems lined with conical spines and small round leaves. It looks much like the American ocotillo but belongs to an unrelated family.

A small shrub from the Eastern Cape of South Africa with short, fleshy stems swollen at the base, thin net-veined obovate leaves clustered at the tips and bright yellow daisies on long stalks. Unusually for Othonna, it tends to stay evergreen.

A South African Pachypodium with pink bell-shaped flowers and large underground caudex.

Known in Japan as Aasoukai. A south-western Madagascan Pachypodium with a thick, spiny, silver-grey trunk rising like a column and a crown of long, narrow leaves with a bright pink midrib. One of the largest species in the genus.

A hardy South African Pachypodium with pink flowers and large underground caudex.

The Queensland bottle tree, endemic to Queensland, Australia, with a swollen bottle-shaped trunk and narrow leaves. Juvenile leaves are deeply divided and look quite different from the narrow adult leaves.

A South African milkweed-family caudex with gray round tuber producing vines, hardy for beginners.

A caudiciform legume from south-western Madagascar with thick zigzag branches and small pinnate leaves. Even small plants have a swollen base and look like a miniature old tree; the flowers are bright yellow.

A small mesemb caudex with bonsai-like form and cute pink flowers, easy from seed.