Members of the genus Sarcocaulon, which is placed in the Geraniaceae family, are spiny, fleshy shrublets with delicate white, yellow, salmon-pink or pink petals (‘flowers’), confined to South Africa and Namibia. The name Sarcocaulon alludes to the Greek words for fleshy, sarkos, and stems, caulon. Sarcocaulon is a genus of succulent, spiny shrublets with short stems, branching just above soil level. The fleshy branches are prostrate, semi-erect or erect, covered with waxy, translucent bark. The Geraniaceae family is widely distributed and consists of mainly annual or perennial herbs and shrublets, comprising about 700 species. Sarcostemma is a genus of flowering plants in the dogbane family, Apocynaceae, first described as a genus in 1810. Members of the genus are known generally as climbing milkweeds or caustic bushes. They are found across Africa and tropical Asia, in Australia, and in parts of North America. These plants are perennial flowering shrubs with trailing vines or lianas. They are often adapted to heat and/or desert conditions. Some have few or no leaves and photosynthesize in the tissues of the green stems. The soft stems are filled with milky white latex that is poisonous and caustic in some species. The flowers have a ring of thick tissue at the base which extends into hollow spherical appendages within the flower corolla.

Sarcostemma viminale is a leafless succulent plant with cylindrical, green photosynthetic stems. The plant may grow as a shrub or a scandent vine. The stems produce copious amounts of milky exudate when broken. This exudate is caustic in nature and can cause burns if it contacts human skin. The plant produces small white flowers in small clusters. Flowers are followed by long pods which produce seeds with silky plumes that aid in wind dispersal. The environmental range of the species is very broad, extending from rainforest margins and monsoon forests to arid deserts. The plant has many medicinal uses and has been used as a traditional medicine throughout its range to treat a range of conditions, including sores and wounds, smallpox, eye infections, diarrhoea, intestinal and skin parasites and insufficient milk production. This plant is attractive to bees, butterflies and birds.