Antimima ventricosa

Description

Antimima is a succulent plant genus in the family Aizoaceae, indigenous to South Africa and Namibia The Greek word "antimimos" means "imitating", and refers to the similarity some species have to the different genus Argyroderma. The species of this varied genus typically grow as dense cushions or mats. Otherwise, Antimima species are very similar in their superficial looks to the related genus Ruschia, with 3-sided waxy succulent leaves, and pink or white flowers. Antimima ventricosa is a small succulent shrub forming a compact cushion and bearing large flowers. Basally branched with very short internodes. These peculiar plants are heterophyllous, that is to say that they produce leaves of two kinds on a branch: the first pair of the season (for the summer dormant period) connate for almost half its length, sheathing over in summer and enclosing subsequent leaves; other leaf pair (during the winter) up to 4-8(-12) cm long, 13-17 mm broad, 10-13 mm thick, opposite, joined at the base, with a longer free part, keeled near the tip, mucronate, silvery green, waxed and joined with the shorter drier outside pair framing the larger younger inner pair. Free parts trigonous and papillate in both types, but more densely so in younger.