Yesterday was Sunday!

We did more or less the same walk as last week, particularly to see the Therianthus: This below is the first we noticed last week, and I'm holding a single strap-like leaf: All the others seemed to have reed-type leaves. So what are they, spicatus or bracteolatus? One thing is for sure, having watched a single specimen for a full year now, once the flowers have gone, there's only the spent flower to show it's not just another tuft of grass! Otherwise we were drawn to this Pelargonium: The Lanaria lanata is mostly fully open, and the little pink flowers amongst the fluff seem to be past it: This is definitely Micranthus corner! We had a hitch-hiker on the walk: I tried three times to take a photo of this Pseudo selago serrata or Purple Powderpuff, but the wind was too strong, even holding the stem! These Helichrysums have now fully dark red centres, which will go black later: We are hoping these are Roella, if not, we're watching it! The pinkness of this Leucadendron is more noticeable in real life than in the photo! These were growing in the damp sand where we found the Drosera before, they're perhaps 40 to 50mm tall, any ideas? But on the left above, one can see tiny flowers on a single stem: I just couldn't get the camera to focus on the flower and the wind was blowing, but it looks like a sunny-side-up fried egg, but possibly only 3mm across! Any ideas? Nearby, also in wet ground there was an Erica with interesting spherical or urn-shaped flowers: Probably Erica multumbellifera. The deep reddish colour of the Brunia flowers is looking impressive amongst the foliage! Well, more questions than answers! Finally at home, a female Sunbird was 'working through' the Wilde Dagga: She has the right beak for the job! Have a Great New Year! :-) A

It's Sunday!

Hello all, We've both had a kind of flu so we didn't tackle too much today, chosing a slightly different loop and we were well rewarded! Firstly we have to go past the ruins of the railway gangers foreman's house. Somebody there in the past must have been a really keen gardener and the plants are now growing wild. There's a huge stand of orange day-lilies, backed up by Acanthus mollis: Close by are prickly pears: Now is the best time of the year for the Combflower or Micranthus: We've been watching the Lanaria lanata for the tiny flowers amongst all the white fluff It's also the time of year for the colourful but stinky Helichrysum foetidum. That's close enough, it smells dead! Here's a tall shrub called Psoralea pinnata:   The white Helichrysums are all over, their centres getting darker:  On a road we don't use often we were rewarded by several Therianthus bracteolatus: Although we're used to them having round leaves, this particular one above had strap-like leaves. Perhaps makes this a spicatus? The books give confusing information! The twist in the flower is very noticeable. Close by were some splendid specimens of Wachendorfia paniculata which must have been impressive in full flower. Now the seed-pods are bright orange: Just to show there are Ericas around: And the ever-present Lobelias: We noticed that several Brunias had been cut back, presumably for flower arrangements. This magnificent one has escaped. To finish off, Hydrangeas are Christmas Roses here, so how about a few from Gay's driveway? Happy Christmas! :-) A

Another walk

-------Original Message------- Another wonderful walk today, all within perhaps 5km from home. We were away a long time because we kept stopping and finding new flowers! We've taken to walking with the Botsoc Hottentots Holland to Hermanus book, so at least some we can look up then and there. But first, at the Ganger's houses: A bee in a newly opened prickly pear. Lots of closed buds waiting! Some kind of puff-ball fungus, in the path, waiting to be trodden on! The helichrysums are superb still, different types seem to be opening the whole time, at different locations, or perhaps altitudes? It seems there are 250 types and it means sun - gold in Greek. The centres of ours seem to start with a red ring around a white centre, then they go dark eventually black. Yet today we found one with a yellow centre: There was evidence of pollen, too in some: This below is wild lobelia, and there's lots of it, very fine flowers but the colour stands out Most of the Wachendorfias (from last week) have gone to seed, a strange turban-type pod with three or four (?) segments. We'll watch how they progress while drying. This is a new one for us, as yet unidentified, but possibly an Aristea. The shears for size comparison (had some pruning to do at home on the way back) The bud of what we think is a king protea, by the shape of the leaves. There's lots of new leaf growth at the moment. The pods don't seem to be giving up their seeds, this old one has been open for years, maybe it has to have a fire? We started seeing several of these, serrated leaves, all the way to the ground (some have not) Selago serrata. This was a chance sighting, one only, well hidden: The plant has thin flat long leaves Bobartia longicyma of the iris family is the cosest we can find to it. This caught our eyes, here's the flower: Possibly selago again, but looked different. The flower below: I was taking a pic of this possibly restio to show how tall it is (I have seen these on Groenlandberg) when I noticed a particularly colourful daisy (many are past their prime now) The flower was stunning! Again, just a patch of them. Brian Pickering does quad-bike Nature Discovery tours here and he says there's a place he gets the visitors to climb off and in a small walk around, there are 70 species of plant. It's not surprising, here and in previous trips we've only really noticed and photographed thoose in spectacular form at the time. Here is only one daisy, there must be many; restios, heaths (ericas) are past their best now, but today we did stop for this one: (windy, sorry! ) Flowers like our cigarette bush! I said the helichrysums are at their best, in places it looks like snow in the mountains from a distance! Seeing the pines coming up again, the astonishing thing is that just a few years ago this was pine forest and nothing else grew under them. These have all come up spontaneously, and will I presume disappear when the pines grow up again. There was a time that it was decided that pines could not grow economically in the Cape (or in our area) and these areas were felled and re-growth cut, pulled out or poisoned by Cape Nature Conservation. It seems there's been a re-think and the pines are growing again! Nearly home, we often snap this one, it's in a growth mode at the moment: This one's struggling in the middle of a jeep-track: We'd seen a better example last week and snapped it again today: I could go on and on..... but it's making our walks so much more interesting! :-) A