2021 – Dan Mahr: Succulents in Kenya

Guest speaker Dan Mahr described a 2006 CSSA field trip to Kenya for the March 2021 meeting of HSCSS. The two-week outing covered hundreds of miles in southern Kenya, visiting 50 succulent sites and finding 110 plant taxa, as well as giraffes, hippos, lions and baboons.

Mahr’s photos showed landscapes from grasslands to rocky, vegetated hillsides and distant mountains. Among the many interesting plants were vining ceropegias and tiny huernias, as well as caudiciform cucurbits, ficus plants and adenia. Mahr mentioned that many commiphoras are native to Kenya, and showed a spiny species and another with blue bark. Other succulent groups include medium-sized to large aloes, sansevierias and lots of euphorbias, which include large trees and “a lot of little shrubby things,” Mahr said.