Sarcostemma viminale, in Afrikaans the melktou (milk string), is a robust climber that produces a mass of branched cylindrical stems of up to 7 m in length and between 5 mm and 1 cm in diameter. Their tips may be as high as the host tree's height will allow. The plant is variable in habit, sometimes shrub-like or prostrate where no neighbouring plants (victims) could be found. The variability may be ascribed to the diverse habitats within which the plant has become adapted.
Melktou may appear lush and green if growing near a watercourse. The trailing stems will twine and scramble where plants, rocks or other supports provide the opportunity. It is here seen hanging from a tree in the Kruger National Park during January. Weak trees may be smothered and brought down by the sheer mass of the swollen, succulent, grey-green to yellow-green young stem parts.
Lower down, the old stems become pale brown and woody with rough and corky bark. The white milky latex contained in the stems is quickly noted when the stem surface is damaged. The latex is toxic in some regions where the plant grows, therefore best avoided. There are, however, also records of the plant, or some forms of it, being edible. Sarcostemma viminale is leafless (Germishuizen and Fabian, 1982; Letty, 1962; www.repository.up.ac.za).