African Mistletoe Got its Name

African Mistletoe

African Mistletoe is parasitic, tropical mistletoe which was named in 2010 after first being discovered near the summit of Mount Mabu in northern Mozambique.  Northern Mozambique is a region which hit the headlines in 2008 when a Kew-led expedition uncovered this lost world. African Mistletoe was spotted in northern Mozambique by the expedition’s renowned East African butterfly specialist, Colin Congdon. Scientists at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew have in 2010 discovered some other weird, wonderful and stunning mistletoe from the rainforests of Cameroon to the UK’s North Pennines.

Mistletoe is the common name for a group of hemi-parasitic plants that grow attached to and within the branches of a tree or shrub. The name was originally applied to Viscum album (European Mistletoe, Santalaceae), the only species native in Great Britain and much of Europe.