African potato

• The African potato mainly grows in natural grasslands in the eastern summer rainfall regions of South Africa
• The African potato is especially cultivated by traditional healers in KwaZulu-Natal and Pondoland
• The African potato is a bulbous perennial plant with long, ribbon-shaped, bright green leaves and star-shaped flowers
• A large, dark brown, bitter tasting, bulbous structure, known as a corm, grows underground and is covered with bristly hairs
• The corm has an unpleasant bitter taste
• A corm is a compressed underground stem that develops vertically
• The corms are dormant underground in winter and they sprout in summer to form leaves and flowers
• Natural seasonal fires in the region stimulate regrowth and germination of seeds
• The African potato does not grow from seeds easily and normally reproduces by division of the corn to form new plants
• Urbanisation places natural grasslands under great pressure by shrinking the natural habitat of the African potato