Woodland Rothmannia

fischeri: named after Dr Gustav Fischer (1848-1886), German doctor, explorer and collector in Tanzania.

Shrub or small tree. Bark grey-brown, smooth and peeling, revealing patches of the rusty underlayer. Leaves opposite, narrowly to broadly elliptic to obovate, somewhat leathery, shiny dark green above, paler below, hairless except for hairtuft domatia in the axils of the lateral veins and the midrib. Flowers bell-shaped and showy, solitary, up to 8 cm in diameter, cream with purple-pink markings in the corolla throat. Fruit spherical, hard, 3-6 cm in diameter, green with pale spots, turning blackish when ripe. See subsp. moramballae (Hiern) Bridson for comparison

Zimbabwe, Mozambique and KwaZulu-Natal, S Africa