Climbing Onion Bowiea volubilis

Climbing Onion is a large, exposed, green, scaly bulb with slender, twining, leafless, green stems and small, green-white flowers. It is a succulent perennial that thrives in the dry desert regions of eastern and southern Africa, but outside of its native environment, it is more often grown as a houseplant or as a specimen plant. The plant has overlapping scales, which form a spherical bulb that grows to 8 inches above the soil and sends up a twining, green, branched stem with few linear deciduous leaves. In winter, the plant is dormant and the outer scales dry to a paper-like state. In late spring and summer, the plant produces one or more fast-growing stems covered with leafless side-branches that may fall off. The small greenish-white flowers appear in spring. The genus is named after James Bowie, a nineteenth-century British plant collector for Kew Gardens, and there is a single species, volubilis.

Climbing Onion prefers gritty well-drained soil in partial sun to shade. Water regularly during the growing season, and rarely if at all during dormancy. Propagate from seed, divisions, or from individual scales. The plant is not cold hardy and will suffer at temperatures below 50 degrees F. The plant is not an onion and is not edible, but rather is in the lily family.

Diseases, Insect Pests, and Other Plant Problems:

No known diseases or insect pests.