Botterboom

Tylecodon paniculatus is a thickset, robust succulent dwarf tree up to 2.5–3 m tall, with very fat stems with usually well branched rounded crown. The single main trunk and branches are covered with mustard-yellow to olive-green bark peeling in papery semi-translucent sheets. Branches are short, with prominent leaf scars. Leaves are clustered and spirally arranged around the apex of the growing tips simple during the wintertime; they are paddle-shaped, 5–12 cm long and 2–10 cm wide, thickly succulent, bright yellowish-green; apex is broadly tapering to rounded, base is tapering without petiole. The plant is deciduous. Inflorescences are spectacular slender, ascending thyrses to 40 cm, with bright crimson-red stalks. Flowers have five joined sepals and five joined petals, forming an orange-yellow to red urn-shaped tube 1.5–2.5 cm long with spreading lobes. Ten stamens are pendulous at first, then upright as the petal-tube dries. It hybridises with Tylecodon wallichii.

The species grows in the arid, winter rain-fall regions from Namibia to the southwestern South Africa.

The genus name is a syllabic anagram of the former name Cotyledon, created by Helmut Toelken who split a few species off into a genus of their own. The species Latin epithet refers to the shape of inflorescence — branched terminal panicles. The common names refer to soft, fleshy and brittle stems. For centuries children have used the soft, slippery stems as sleds.