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Aloe mawii "Malawi Form" (Tree Khuzi) - A small tree-like aloe to 6 feet tall, unbranched or sparingly branched with dense rosettes of 2-foot-long red tinged grey-green leaves that are 3 to 4 inches wide at the base and tapper to recurved narrowed tips with reddish margins and orange-brown teeth. In mid-winter (January-February) in Southern California, when the foliage is often entirely red, appear the long inflorescences arching outward with reddish orange flowers held horizontally facing upward on one side of the stem (secund) with exerted blue-purple stamens tipped with orange anthers - quite attractive and unusual!
Plant in full sun in a well-drained soil and irrigate occasionally to infrequently. Cold hardy for short duration to around 25° F - has sustained damage at 27° F in Ojai California so likely best for coastal gardens or more frost-free locations.
This form is the more tree-like form with heavy stems that comes from the type locality is on the Zomba Plateau in Malawi, but this species also grows into Mozambique and into southern Tanzania where it grows on grassy rocky slopes at altitudes between 1,800 and 6,000 feet. We have also long grown a more shrub-like lower branching form that we call Aloe mawii "Mozambique Form". The specific epithet honors Captain A.H. Maw, on whose property in Malawi the type specimen was collected. Common names include Chinthembwe (Nyanja, Tumbuka), Khuzi (Ngoni) and lichongwe (Yao). Though we have both this more tree-like form and the shruby form of this species in our nursery, all of our plants originated from cuttings received as Aloe mawii IAS12-019c from the Institute of Aloe Studies (IAS) in 2012. John Miller of IAS told us that his stock plant, which in 2016 had a 3- to 4-foot-tall trunk branching with 5 heads, was originally purchased from Exotica Nursery in Germany. We have sold the form we now call "Mozambique Form" since 2017 and in 2023 began selling this more tree-like form as "Malawi Form".
The information displayed on this page about Aloe mawii "Malawi Form" is based on our research conducted about this plant from books in our nursery library as well as from information that is provided by reliable online resources. We also have included our own observations made about it as it grew in the nursery gardens and other gardens visited, as well how the crops of this plant performed in the containers when we had them in our nursery field. We also include comments received from others and welcome hearing from anyone who has information about this plant, particularly if it includes cultural information aiding others to better grow it.
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