Japanese name: クシフィディウム カエルレウム Scientific name:Xiphidium caeruleum
[Overview]
A perennial 30–80 cm tall, up to 2 m in large specimens.
The rhizome creeps horizontally and sends out stolons about 50 cm long.
Sometimes young plants form in the axils of lower leaves or bracts.
The leaves are 20–50 cm long and 1.5–4.5 cm wide, linear to sword-shaped, alternate in a fan arrangement, with the leaf bases clasping the stem.
The leaf tips are pointed and arch downward, and the surface is glossy.
The leaves are slightly wrinkled lengthwise along the veins.
The leaf margins are entire.
Because the leaf bases overlap, a well-developed plant looks from a distance as if it has palmate leaves.
Panicles at the tips of flower stalks extending from the leaf axils bear many white to cream, 6-petaled flowers about 1 cm across.
The fruit is a spherical capsule 0.5–1 cm in diameter, first green, changing from orange to red, and finally ripening to black.
