Haworthia obserata Marx
By Gerhard Marx - 29 July 2023
This is another published name that has been dismissed as yet another ecotype of Haworthia mirabilis.
If the concept of ‘mirabilis’ implies only to summer-flowering and chunky retuse-leaved plants, then I am in semi-agreement except that Haworthia obserata grows somewhat outside the general range for Haworthia mirabilis.
Haworthia obserata occurs in two known localities north of the Langeberg range, while most of the several hundred populations labelled under ‘mirabilis’ by Bayer are south of the mountains.
But to revisit the original features defining Haworthia mirabilis, one has to briefly return to the original 1804 description of Aloe mirabilis by Haworth: “an Aloe with leaves in five rows, retuse-deltoid, cuspidate; margins and keel ciliate-spinose, face glabrous, back little tuberculate and hardly reticulate.” He gave it the nickname of “the rough-cushion Aloe”, emphasizing the tuberculate texture along the leaf sides and consistently spiny leaf margins and keel.
Above paragraph should be copied and pasted as introduction to many of the new names being burdened with a ‘mirabilis’ label. It shows that the whole ‘mirabilis’ concept as currently applied is flawed and proves that even old and familiar species like badia and mundula do not quite fit the mirabilis profile.
At its type locality, Haworthia obserata grows together with Tulista opalina. The latter being such a rare and sought-after collectors’ item caused the farm owners to develop very strong feelings against any succulent tourists wanting to visit the locality and they refuse permission to all succulent tourists. It was this strictly forbidden situation of the type locality that inspired the name ‘obserata’.
In 2015 I received the welcome news from Andries Cilliers that he had encountered another population for Haworthia obserata a few kilometres to the east.
At the latter locality Haworthia obserata grows very close to Haworthia breueri ( = H. emelyae var major) and H. multifolia ( = H. emelyae var multifolia). A small distance to the west are also a population of H. maraisii, the only other summer-flowering element in the area.
Haworthia obserata can also have the dull light ‘dusky dots’ as found in H. groenewaldii but much more subtle and rather infrequent. This can be seen best on the photo of the plant in cultivation below.
