Almost all Yellow Sunday Flower walk

It was so yellow that we longed to see another colour! But first, in our own garden, I couldn't go past this Clivia without snapping it! All over, they seem to be beautiful this year!

Then yesterday at Compagnes Drift Mill, where we celebrated Heritage Day, this Gazania stopped me in my tracks. In fact later in the day there was a second one growing through it, the bud must have been behind it!

As we were enjoying lunch outside, listening to the machinery inside creaking away, a Lesser Double-collared Sunbird was having lunch on an aloe too.

The Coral tree there is shy to set flowers, but they are impressive when they do!

This morning on the farm, Pippa spotted an Aristea africana open. I rushed out with the camera, knowing they're a mornings-only flower!

Another sign of spring, a Pin-tailed Whydah flirting with a couple of females in the garden.

Yes, the walk today was mostly yellow. I was wondering why some people travel long distances for Spring Flowers when they're right here!

Up close, vying for a space in the sun!

It seemed the only other colour was pink in several shades, Sheep Sorrel here:

.... and the Pelargoniums are still in flower:

We found another example of the peppery-scented-leaves one, right next to the path too:

Also pink were these little pea types:

Flower detail:

.... these Teedias:

and our faithful Saltera sarcocolla!

A lot of our walk was in the recently deforested (and by chance also burnt) area where we were often watched by these Stone Chats:

A plant we've found has really established itself since the fire of nearly two years ago is the Trachyandra. It's not impressive, with tiny pinkish flowers, bootlace like leaves, but the bees go mad about it!

On what we think is Pseudoselago spuria the flowers are filling out:

This plant has us stumped! Will it ever flower to help us identify it?

The pathway past the old Railway cottages always comes up trumps. Now the Beetle Lilies are up, but not fully open yet, Baeometra uniflora:

These now join the Sparaxis bulbiflora:

Geissorhiza aspera:

Was this the only blue flower all day? No! The Lobelias were also out!

 ... and these orange Moraeas all in 50 metres!

:-) Andy

Roellas are back! Sunday Flower walk

So are we, after a long break, partly caused by the weather being either too hot or too wet, also by a bereavement in the family. Today we went out not expecting to see much, but as usual, once you look carefully, the gems are there!

After not finding Roellas last year at all, it seemed, now we are finding them again, and some of the flowers are huge!

Roella ciliata (?)

There are two types, the flowers as well as the leaves differ. Those with the black patches on the petals have stems with dense leaves We think this is R. ciliata.

View of the whole plant

The pale-flowered one has pointed petals and is possibly R. incurva.

Roella incurva or dregeana?

Or is it R. dregeana?

View from the top

But first, back to the beginning! The dam on the Experimental Farm has two kinds of Nymphaea growing and flowering at the same time. I can't remember this happening before.

Nymphaea indica:

Nymphaea indica

A whole patch far out in the water

And Nymphaea nouchali:

Nymphaea nouchali

There are less of them

Since the fire, now nearly a year ago, the deep blue Lobelia seem darker, with bigger flowers and certainly more of them!

Is this Lobelia coronopifolia?

Could they be L. coronopifolia?

The whole plant

We expected to find all the Agapanthus walshii over and hopefully full of seeds. Here was one still opening!

Agapanthus walshii still opening

There is a good crop of seeds on others:

Plenty of seeds!

We were surprised and very pleased to still find some Watsonia schlechteri in flower, although most have finished flowering:

Watsonia schlechteri

This looks like an Aristea:

An Aristea?

Close by, we found a Tritoniopsis lata, we think:

Tritoniopsis lata (?)

Flower detail

This one is almost swallowed up by an Othonna quinquedentata:

Another one

That is certainly something which has reacted well to the fire, here's another, completely covered by tiny flowers:

Huge Othonna quinquedentata

On the way home we had a look for flowers on the Buchu Agathosma crenulata. Not many, but the offspring growing all around it means that there are lots of seeds around!

Agathosma ciliata flower

In the road we found many of these little yellow flowers:

What is this?

Three petals plus one... another pea?

So, it was a very rewarding walk after all!

:-) A

Corymbium glabrum Sunday Flower Walk

There's always something interesting in the derelict garden of the railway cottages! At the moment it's a splendid stand of deep oraange Day Lilies growing amongst Acanthus mollis:

Day Lilies and Acanthus mollis in the derelict garden of the Railway Cottages

Today we went looking for a group of Watsonia schlechteri we remembered in the unburnt area just above the railway line.

Watsonia schlechteri

Then Pippa remembered there was a plant which we had never identified before, growing right there. Here is a bunch of spent flowers:

Aspalathus callosa? 

For the first time we've found flowers still on it, another yellow pea! Possibly Aspalathus callosa.

Flower detail

This gives an idea of the size of the plant, it must have been impressive with many of the flowers open!

Whole plant

We're sorry to have missed this little plant flowering.

An Aristea? 

The spent flowers or seed pods looked familiar:

Spent flower up close

Later in the walk we looked at the Aristea bakeri we have been watching (below), and found very similar pods. Could this (above) be Aristea racemosa, or A. juncifolia? It was past 4pm so it might have flowered this morning.

Spent flowers of Aristea bakeri elsewhere

Our first Therianthus this year! Growing here amongst Pseudoselago spuria which have nearly finished flowering. On the right are more about to open.

First Therianthus!

Here was an interesting plant, easily overlooked, but I spotted tiny flowers on the tips.

Untidy red plant, lying down, with tiny pink flowers at the tips

Flower detail

Here is another plant, not so far advanced:

Les advanced plant, upright and greener

We were aiming for the stand of Agapanthus walshii we have been watching open gradually for a few weeks.

Agapanthus walshii

The way the flowers hang sets them apart.

Ten Agapanthus walshii flowers or buds on one plant!

We counted 45 buds or flowers in this small area. Not bad for an extremely rare plant!

Agapanthus walshii flowers

A little way on, while watching a pair of black crows, Pippa noticed a splash of deep pink. Corymbium glabrum var glabrum, unless there's another variety with this deeper pink.

Deep pink Corymbium

We were making for the Curlygrass fern Schizaea pectinata we had found before, to find the fans of the flowers more fully developed and greener than before:

Curlygrass Schizaea pectinata flowers up close

I spotted what I thought was yet another Purple Powder Puff Pseudoselago serrata, but this was growing too close to the ground. Close up it was something completely different!

This looks familiar, but we can't remember what it is! 

The flowers are deceptively long trumpets, and if you look carefully you can see long forked stamens coming out of some of the flowers. The closest we get is Merciera, but this grows too close to the ground for them.

Flower detail, long trumpets and longer stamens!

We found another Corymbium, further advanced and much paler than the previous one.

Paler Corymbium

Up there we found this Purple Powder Puff Pseudoselago serrata, definitely the biggest of the day!

The biggest Powder Puff we found today!

We wanted to check on the offspring of the burnt Pagoda flower Mimetes cucullatus which would have been in flower now. The babies are looking well!

Baby Mimetes cucullatus

These have clearly grown from seed scattered from the parent close by. Also in the Protea family, where we were disappointed that the re-growth we had seen at the bases of Protea cynaroides had shrivelled up, we are now finding seedlings close by:

Baby Protea cynaroides

What I thought last week was a Tar Pea Bolusafra bituminosa was identified by the experts as Rhynchosia because its leaves were in threes and pointed. This is more like it, with rounded leaves! We forgot to check if it was sticky!

Tar Pea Bolusafra bituminosa

It's late in the year to be finding Albuca. The latest in the books, up to November is A. cooperi, otherwise A. juncifolia would be a contender.

Albuca, but which one? 

The leaves look like this:

Albuca leaf

We stopped off at the Watsonia borbonica from last week, looking as good as before!

Watsonia borbonica

And near it a sea of Combflowers, Micranthus:

Combflowers Micranthus

On the way back, this 'Weed' looked a bit out of place!

The 'Weed'

How did it get there?

Leaf detail

:-) A