Stellenbosch University Botanical Garden, South Africa

Common name: Black bat flower, Tigers Whiskers

Family: Dioscoreaceae (Yam)

Distribution: Southeast Asia

IUCN Red list: Not evaluated

Comments: It has attractive leaves, a vertical growth habit and strange filiform (thread-like) bracts which can hang down for as much as 1.2m, below the flowers. It is these structures and their accompanying cluster of luridly coloured flowers that has given rise to the sobriquet “batflower”. Cloaking the flowers from above are 2 broad light coloured and showy bracts, expanding like wings.