Click on images to enlarge
large population (Photo: Sheldon Navie)
habit (Photo: Sheldon Navie)
habit in flower (Photo: Sheldon Navie)
large slightly fleshy leaves (Photo: Sheldon Navie)
flower clusters in the leaf forks (Photo: Sheldon Navie)
close-up of purplish floral bracts leaf undersides (Photo: Sheldon Navie)
close-up of white flowers (Photo: Sheldon Navie)
Scientific Name
Tradescantia spathacea Sw.
Synonyms
Rhoeo discolor (L'Hér.) HanceRhoeo spathacea (Sw.) StearnTradescantia discolor L'Hér.
Family
Commelinaceae
Common Names
boat lily, boat plant, boat-lily, boatlily, cradle lily, Moses in a boat, Moses in a cradle, Moses in the basket, Moses in the cradle, Moses-in-a-basket, Moses-in-a-boat, Moses-in-the-bulrushes, Moses-in-his-cradle, Moses-in-the-cradle, oyster plant, oysterplant, rhoeo, three men in a boat, three-men-in-the-boat
Origin
Native to southern Mexico, Central America (i.e. Belize and Guatemala) and the Caribbean.
Naturalised Distribution
Occasionally naturalised in coastal districts of northern and central Queensland. Also naturalised on Lord Howe Island, Christmas Island and the Cocos Islands.
Widely naturalised overseas in southern Africa (i.e. Kenya and Tanzania), temperate Asia (e.g. China and Japan), south-western USA (i.e. Louisiana and Florida), the Seychelles, La Réunion and on some Pacific islands (e.g. the Cook Islands, Fiji, French Polynesia, Guam, Niue, New Caledonia, Palau, Western Samoa, Tonga and Hawaii).
Notes
Moses-in-the-cradle (Tradescantia spathacea) is regarded as an environmental weed in Queensland and is also listed in the Global Invasive Species Database (GISD).
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