Eucharis ruthiana L. Jost, Oleas & Meerow

Geophytic, evergreen perennial from tunicate bulbs, tunics reddish brown, thin; immature bulb ca. 3 cm × 2.5 cm. Leaves (Fig. 3A–C) 2–5 per bulb, glabrous, tapering at base to a 19–18 cm long pseudopetiole that is 6–8 mm thick; lamina elliptical, ca. 28 cm × 9 cm, dark green adaxially and shallowly plicate, light green abaxially, acute at apex. Inflorescence scapose, scape 8–16 flowered, ca. 40 cm tall, 4 mm diam, terete, glaucous, solid, terminated by 2 greenish-white, eventually marcescent ovate-lanceolate bracts enclosing the buds in the early stages of elongation, ca. 3 cm long, ca. 5 mm wide at base, acute at apex. Flowers (Fig. 3D–G) slightly declinate, white, mildly fragrant, 4.5–5.0 cm long; pedicels 2–6 cm long, the last flowers to reach anthesis with the longest, with a narrow bracteole subtending each. Perianth (Fig. 3D, E) actinomorphic, funnelform-campanulate, consisting of six tepals in two whorls, fused below the throat into a slightly curved tube that is 15–2.0–2.2 cm long 2.7–3 mm diam, white for its entire length, cylindrical in the proximal 1.3–1.5 cm, then funnel-form distally, dilating to 0.85–10.0 mm at throat, limb spreading ca. 60° from the throat, 5–6 cm wide; outer tepals 28–36 mm × 15 mm, acute, with a white, ca. 3 mm long papillose apiculum; inner tepals 27–35 × 17–19 mm, minutely apiculate. Stamens joined at base into a 2.5–3.0 × 1.5–2.0 cm staminal corona deeply divided into six pairs of lanceolate, free, tooth-like processes, such that only the lower 2.6–3.0 mm of the corona is connate, stained yellowish-green along the filamental traces, most prominently on the inside surface; each tooth 7.5–8 mm long, acute at the apex and slightly recurved above the middle, with the six free filaments inserted between the teeth of each pair; free filaments narrowly subulate, slightly incurved towards center of the corona, 3–4 mm long, anthers oblong, 3–4 × < 1 mm, white, dorsifixed, introrse; pollen white. Style 2.3–2.6 cm long, not exserted past stamens, white; stigma tri-lobed, papillate, ca. 2 mm wide. Ovary ellipsoid, 4–5 mm long, ca. 3.2 mm wide, ovules 16–20 per locule, superposed, axile in placentation. Ripe fruit green, seed globose, bluish-black.