Aloe species are grown as ornamentals in gardens and pots. Typical xerophytic plants, Aloe species have fleshy leaves which are strongly cuticularized and usually prickly at the margins. Only known as cultivated or naturalized plant, Aloe takes three years to attain harvestable size and can be harvested for seven years. While aloetic juice (for preparations of the purgative aloes) is contained in the large pericyclic cells, it flows out when the leaves are cut. The mucilage of wound healing and cosmetic importance occupying about 3/5th of the diameter of the leaf is present in the large parenchymatous cells. Aloetic juice is collected from leaves transversely cut near the base. About 200 such leaves are arranged round a shallow hole lined with canvas or plastic sheet. The juice draining out of the entire system of pericyclic cells in the leaves gets collected. It is allowed to flow out without applying pressure to prevent contamination with mucilage coming out of the parenchymatous cells. The collected juice is then evaporated suitably and poured into containers for solidification. This is the purgative aloes. The mucilage is collected form the leaves drained of aloetic juice as quickly as possible to avoid degradation of the polysaccharides it contains.