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An auspicious day

Posted on October 22, 2014 by fynbosblog One comment

A lovely run last night at the end of an auspicious day. My nephew Beckett James Grey Mulhern was born in New York. Birthday the 21st of October; an autumn child, harvest festivals and pumkins, the trees in Ireland wonderful shades of red and gold as you drive down Wexford roads to the Opera Festival. The huge full moon. October has always been a happy month in our family.

I remembered to take a couple of whiffs of the inhaler before we left the house which meant the lungs were clear to convert oxygen as needed and we fairly bounded up the mountain in the fading evening light. As we climbed higher I could hear the baboons calling in the forest. Maebh and Jemima Chew heard them too and shot off to explore. Luckily they decided not to go too far and quickly came back to Seamus and to me as we climbed higher. I have a new weapon against wandering wolfhounds – you can see it in this photo of Leucadendron tinctum in which Meabh elegantly arranged herself in the background.

The cones of Leucodendron tinctum with Maebh in the background

The white you can see on her collar is a tracker. I found it online, it’s German, works brilliantly in South Africa and tracks your dogs live when they go missing. When the wolfhounds wander we get incredibly worried; we know they can travel a long way and dogs have been lost on this mountain more than once. Shouldn’t happen with this cute little piece of technology which links to the iPhone.

The baboons used to come down into the olive groves and even as far as the gum trees behind the house. I haven’t seen them for quite a while, they really hate the wolfhounds.

One of my favourite flowers, Aristea capitata is in full flower at the moment. There is a colony on the driveway and the blue spikes are a joy to behold.

Aristea capitata

This was one of the special evenings. No wind, the end of a hot day with a dampness in the air that cooled us as we ran higher. Lovely light. When we stopped for a drink at the weir Maebh, who was in a modeling mood today, stood in front of the Ilex Mitis as I took a photo of the white trunks gleaming in the evening light. With her dappled coat she almost disappears.

Maebh and the Ilex Mitis

Paarl holds an iconic place in the South Africa psyche and the two huge granite rocks that stand above the town to the west are unmistakable to anyone who knows the Cape. Maebh, once again, stood for a moment to watch as the sun slipped away behind the rocks, which happens just at this time of year. Soon it will be setting well to the west, over Table Mountain.

Maebh watches the sun setting over Paarl Rock

There are so many flowers in bloom that it’s hard to know where to begin. One is this tiny Pelargonium, I don’t know what it’s called but I do like the pink tinge to the end of the petals.

Pelagonium

Another is a favourite, the spikes of Microdon dubium.

Microdon dubium

Talking of dubiums, some new bulbs have emerged. This is Ornitholagum dubium. It flowers in just one place on the farm and there it flowers copiously.

Ornitholagum dubium

This one I’m less sure of – Bobartia I think, possibly Bobartia indica.

Bobatia indica

The farm is covered in this one, charmingly known as Lady’s Hand, because the petals, bent back in greeting, resemble the hand of a delicate girl waving a hello. Cyanella hyacinthoides.

Cyanella hyacinthoides

There’s a plethora of peas on the go at the moment and this is Aspalanthus cordite, unmistakable with its grumpy spiky leaves.

Aspalanthus cordite

I love this shrub – Passerina cormybosa. They are supposed to be pink and yellow, while we have some that some that seem to be white as well.

Passarina cormybosa

There is masses of Lobelia along the roads, this one I think is Lobelia coronopifolia.

Lobelia coronopifolia

Another flower that is to be found absolutely everywhere and is flourishing in the garden as well is Scabious africana. This one is particularly pretty.

Scabious africana

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Balmy days and foggy nights

Posted on August 18, 2014 by fynbosblog One comment

We’ve been having exceptionally warm and sunny weather for the time of year. Although we quite often get an early burst of spring in August, this is really warm – 28 degrees or even higher yesterday and we are still in t-shirts today. The combination of warmth and damp in spring often means foggy patches and a favourite sight is the view from the farm on a foggy morning. We had one breathtaking dawn moment as the full moon set behind Paarl mountain and the fog lapped at the foothills. The moon is never as spectacular in a photo, this one was huge and round and dominated the morning sky.

Moon setting over Paarl

The Lobostemon fruticosus has burst into flower. The dull light brings out the best in it; it has a luminous glow. And sometimes the very first rays of sun just catch the flowers so they are lit from within. The colour ranges from pink to pale blue and the small shrubs are covered in a mass of flowers. We have them everywhere. I have tried to transplant them into the garden but even the small ones have a deep deep tap root that I haven’t succeeded in transplanting intact, so they shrivel and die. Never mind, they clearly prefer the mountain.

Lobostemon fructicosus

It quite often happens that I notice something in a particular area and think of it as rare and special only to find out a few days later that it is all over the farm. This pretty yellow shrub is one of those. I initially didn’t recognise it, and then was quite excited to realise when I had a good look at the photos that it was probably another Hermannia, like the ones we saw last week. Rushed to the book, looked up the Hermannias and sure enough it’s Hermannia althaeifolia, quite a common plant in the region and also used extensively in gardens. Not surprising, it’s a lovely thing. The photo in the reference book isn’t very good though, so I went to iSpot for some clarification and checking those images there can be no doubt.

Hermannia althaeifolia

iSpot is the place for geeks when it comes to fynbos. They ask us to post what we see and I don’t do it enough, but if I can’t identify something, there is always a far more knowledgeable person on iSpot who will. This little white flowering bulb for instance, which I posted a couple of blogs ago, has been identified as Ixia. They were not sure which subspecies, and I can’t find it in any of my reference books, but reading into the more detailed description of the Ixia, I can see what they mean.

Ixia

I don’t know what this absolutely charming white Erica is. There are some serious Erica experts on iSpot though, so I shall post it and see what we come up with.

White Erica

A couple of pelargoniums – the first one is not really spectacular as the photo isn’t very good – but it’s one I haven’t posted yet this year. The other is another, pelargonium myrrhifolium varr myrrhifolium, a pelargonium I posted a couple of weeks ago, from a different plant on a different part of the farm.

Pelargonium myrrhifolium varr. myrrhifolium

Pelargonium

A spring morning

Posted on August 3, 2014 by fynbosblog One comment

On Friday evening the neighbours came to dinner and arrived early for a flower safari. Wonderful to have neighbours who love the mountain as much as we do and who appreciate how special it is. I took them on the old doctors road to see the waterfall which is pounding in its winter splendor. There are hundreds of flowers at this time of year, the wildflower spring commences long before flowers come to the garden. We discovered the old doctor’s road when Peter cleared a veritable forest of wattles along the river; they had overgrown this road and below it, a small but spectacular waterfall. Now this place is a haven for the fynbos which grew back the instant the trees were cleared.

From there we walked up to the weir, a favourite spot and much photographed for this blog because of the magic of the magnificent, ancient, white trunked Ilex Mitis trees, and then on up, above the weir and close to the top of the farm. The sun was setting behind the Paarderberg mountain; a soft mist gathered in the valley below, the evening was completely still, silent, breathless. The gentle warmth of a mild sunny winter’s day coming from the earth beneath our feet. As it grew darker the full dams in the valley gleamed the reflection of the evening sky into the stillness of the coming night. “It’s like a holy place” said Francois, “there’s something spiritual about it.”

Dinner was companionable, cheerful and as we are in wine tasting mode for Christopher’s wedding in January, a little too much drink was taken. Our guests left us late, very happy, as were we.

Perhaps a little less so the following morning when the full consequences of overindulgence emerged, but not enough to prevent me from donning the running clothes and setting off with the wolfhounds and Jemima Chew into the gloomy grey morning on a serious mission to photograph flowers for the blog. The first Babinia fragrens has appeared which is for me the harbinger of spring, and with it shrubs, little trees and tiny plants have burst into flower. I won’t post the Babinia, as there will be thousands more, I didn’t get a great photo and there is so much else to post. It rained heavily during the night, those very still evenings often indicate a change in weather and flowers were covered in raindrops. To my delight I’ve identified two new flowers that I don’t remember seeing last year and which turn out to be related. The first is Hermannia saccifera and the second is Hermannia hyssopifolia, a pretty and sizeable shrub with an unusual flower that has a pin-hole throat and this urn shaped body, called a calyx. Absolutely recognisable when I read the description, there is nothing quite like it.

Hermannia saccifera

Hermannia hyssopifolia

The Hermannia hyssopifolio grows in an area that Peter cleared last year, cutting through old fynbos and finding a large flat area where we least expected it, evidence of terracing by a farmer long ago. A stream runs through this area and shrubs and there is prolific growth along it’s banks, including this sprawling shrub with its sticky leaves and tar-like smell. It’s known as the tar pea, Bolusafra biuminosa, and grows, appropriately enough, along mountain streams.

Bolusafra bitumenosa, the tar pea

Another new identification also grows in this area, Phylica oleaefolia, with these pretty ranks of pale green, cupped flowers. This is quite a tall elegant shrub.

Philyca oleaefolia

We went down to an area where I haven’t been for a while and some of the yellow daisies are still flowering, the Athanasia trifurcata and the Osteospermum spinosum that I mentioned on a blog a couple of months ago. I love when the flower matches the book’s comments perfectly, particularly as the photos don’t always. The Athanasia trifucatum, says the book, has wedge shaped grey leaves, 3-5 toothed at the tips. If you look closely at the leaves in this photo you can clearly see the three teeth.

Osteospermum spinosum

Athanasia trifucatum

In the same place grows a tiny pelargonium, one of my favourite flowers which grows all year round in different parts of the farm. I think it’s Pelargonium myrrhifolium, var. myrrhifolium.

Pelargonium myrrhifolium varr. myrrhifolium

Along the road we walked on Friday night, which I call Erica Alley for the many varieties of Erica that make their home there, are several stunning varieties in flower. Two beautiful examples of the common Erica plukenetii, showing the range of colour, from white with very pale pink, to coral. And some with pretty pink bells in many shades, as well as this lovely white Erica where the bells grow in ranked series but which I have never identified.

Erica plunketii

Erica Plunketii

Erica with tiny pink bells

White Erica, with the flowers growing in orderly rows

A close up of the white Erica showing the tiny protruding anthers

Another pretty shrub which I have not managed to identify. The flowers are green and tiny; so tiny that a single raindrop captures several of them.

And a small tree-like shrub flowering in several places on the farm with prolific drooping flower heads, but I can’t find it in the book.

More familiar friends include Stachys aethiopica, also known as woundwort with it’s mint shaped leaves and pretty little pinky-white flowers.

Stachys aethiopica

All over the farm the buchu is in flower. Agthomsa, mostly crenulata, or a crenulata hybrid, though we also grow lots of Agthomsa betulina. Buchu, the common name, loves the sandy mountain soil and especially the north facing slopes on the farm. The flowers are mostly white but sometimes pretty shades of pink and lilac.

Agthomsa, or buchu with pink flowers

I couldn’t resist capturing Protea burchellii looking stunning in the grey morning light as well as the Leucadendron tinctum. These yellow flower heads will soon turn the most wonderful shade of coral – they are prolific on the mountain and grow in massed groups in certain areas.

Protea burchellii

Leucadendron tinctum

All in all we had a wonderful time, the dogs and I. As a run it wasn’t up to much but as a morning spent together on the mountain, it was the best of times. Maebh has boundless energy and was particularly happy to find a mongoose to chase. He is much much cleverer than she, there was never a chance of her catching him, but she was very pleased with her morning.

Maebh hunting in the olive groves, her coat dark from running in the soaking wet fynbos

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May Day, home, sunset and the warmth of the mountain

Posted on May 1, 2014 by fynbosblog 3 comments

Peter and I both agree that although we both hate leaving the farm to travel, usually for work, the best part is coming home. I’ve been in Europe for a couple of days. One night and two days in London; two nights on planes. I arrived home this morning feeling pretty horrible. This evening in anticipation of a gorgeous sunset, I took the dogs for a walk and the sky lit up with pink and orange out towards the Paaderberg as we walked on the most northern parts of the farm.

A painted sunset, 1 May 2014

I took a different path from our running routes and the slower pace of a walk meant that I saw much more than I do on the morning run. I must do these leisurely walk more often. Three separate daisy-like yellow flowers; always the most frustrating to identify, and a tiny little pelargonium, one of my favourite plants. The mountain was amazing tonight – the days are still warm, but the evenings cool and at dusk you can feel the mountain giving out the warmth it has absorbed during the day into the cool evening air, sending out blasts of heat that I walked through as I returned to the house. The dogs were joyous and Maebh’s pale coat glows in the evening light.

Seamus and Maebh in the fynbos

The Pelargoniums flower here all year round; different plants in different months. Identifying the subspecies is hopeless, but each one gives me great joy.

Autumn Pelargonium

As for the yellow daisy-like flowers. There are three, all on the same road, within 100 metres of one another. The first is an Osteospermum spinosum I think.

Osteospermum spinosum?

The needle-like leaves could be telltale

The second has these splendid clustered flowerheads with gorgeous curly stamens on the tips, with a soft grey-green hairy leaf. You would think that would suffice to identify – but no.

Clustered yellow flowers

Something about the flower makes me think Helichrysum but the leaf says not

Something about the flower makes me think Helichrysum but this thick hairy leaf says not

And the last is a perfect yellow daisy, with clustered spiny leaves. I love the way that these three plants tell me how far I’ve come on my fynbos journey. A year ago they would have looked the same to me; the way your friends’ two dogs both look the same to you, but are completely different to them. Now the differences jump out at me, yet I still can’t identify them. I love that too – that the fynbos journey is without end. I’ll probably never be able to identify every single plant on the farm, a mere pinprick within the Cape Floral Kingdom. But I won’t stop trying.

A perfect daisy, but which perfect daisy?

It's a small shrub with little needly clustered leaves

It’s a small plant with little needly clustered leaves

Christmas Fynbos

Posted on December 27, 2013 by fynbosblog 3 comments

Travel at Christmas is always fraught with risk. We left for a short trip to Ireland to spend the weekend before Christmas with a very dear friend, celebrating his 50th birthday. Thereby infuriating a whole series of family members, who believed that if we were in Ireland that close to Christmas, we should see them, not friends. Sorry. We then braved a lot of stormy flooding roads and wild bouncing skies, along with a Heathrow made worse than ever by the despairing passengers whose flights were cancelled two days before Christmas. Our plane, thank goodness, slipped through the weather and flung itself southwards and even managed to land in Cape Town without crashing, unlike another flight at O R Tambo in Johannesburg which walloped its wing by crashing into a building on the ground causing a mighty row between air traffic control and the British Airways pilot. You can imagine. No-one got hurt.

We arrived home on the 24th, back to the farm, the dogs and our gorgeous friends who came for Christmas. The fabulous David in Paarl did all the catering for us, so we had a wonderful self-indulgent break. Hubert sat beside me at dinner and explained that he doesn’t really love this blog because it’s too academic for him. He’s one of the cleverest people I know, so I think that, as a friend who lives most of the year far away, he’d rather more gossip and fewer flowers. Those last two paragraphs were for you, Hubert.

Meanwhile out on the mountain the dogs and I have been running regularly and loving it. Summer runs take in lots of water breaks. You hear of big dogs dehydrating so I’m careful about that and make sure the dogs are always in sight so that I can spot if anyone gets distressed.

Seamus and Maebh enjoying the water at Fox Pan on a very dry sunny windy morning

Lots of things enjoy the summer weather and the Christmas collection includes a snake nearly trodden on by Noella, who was remarkably calm about it. Also a red lipped tortoise, charming creatures and we see them quite often. This morning a scorpion ran across our path, minding his own business. I love seeing these things, but it’s another good reason to keep the dogs in sight, just in case they get too inquisitive about something nasty.

The flowers may not be profuse, but there are still plenty of things out there to interest us. Some choose to flower in the hottest driest of weather, like the helichrysum that covers the mountain.

Helichrysum

There are plenty of Pelargoniums that don’t mind the heat and choose the hottest months for their flowering. I’ve taken a lesson from the mountain and planted lots more of these in the garden.

One of the many subspecies of wild Pelargonium that grows on the mountain

I have only seen these orange spikes in one particularly damp spot on the road that leads up to the pine forest. They are known as wild dagga and the dried leaves traditionally have been used medicinally but are not a narcotic or tobacco substitute, contrary to what some of the local residents have told me.

Wild dagga, Leonotus leonurus

I love this Selago corymbosa which flowers only in the dry months on it’s long softly spiking stems.

Selago corymbosa

There are 35 fynbos lobelias and they are really stunning, especially in close up. I’m going to suggest that this one is Lobelia pinifolia because many of them have hairless flowers while this one is quite clearly hairy.

Lobelia pinifolia

This is known as the blue pea and is most likely Psoralea restioloides, choosing to flower late in its season near the stream that marks our boundary with the nature reserve at the top of the farm.

Psorolea restioloides, the blue pea

This, oddly, is known as the Christmasberry, although it flowers at Christmas and the spectacular red berries appear in the autumn. It is a common shrub, with a distribution along the coasts and a good way inland from Namaqualand on the West Coast of South Africa all the way to KwaZulu-Natal on the Eastern Coast. Perhaps among all those different habitats there is one in which the berries appear at Christmas.

Christmas berry, Chironia baccifera

I love these protea cones though I can’t remember which member of the protea family this shrub belongs to.

Protea cone

This time of year brings the most magnificent sunsets and with friends staying we often take a sunset walk with the dogs. We’ve had tremendous winds this spring and suddenly over Christmas they’ve dropped and the weather has been perfect, sunny but not too hot. The air is amazing, a light breeze, slight damp dew falling as the sun goes down. Fewer flowers perhaps but the valley below us is a theatre of glorious changing light.

The evening light in the olive groves above the house

Sunset on Christmas Day

Wild windy summer sunsets

Posted on December 11, 2013 by fynbosblog Leave a comment

I never get tired of looking at the view from the balcony and because we look west we have wonderful sunsets. Tonight’s was special by any standard. I took this photo just as the sun had gone down – no filter, just the last light of the setting sun reflected from the clouds onto the dam.

Sunset over the dam

We had Christopher, the brother-in-law, to stay and before he left I offered to take him up the mountain and show him the flowers. All spring we’ve had a wonderful time showing our guests the wonders of the mountain fynbos flowers. That time has passed. He loved being up on the mountain but the flowers have become sparse and less interesting to the casual visitor. A really passionate gardner might still enjoy it – for the less passionate there is merely fading and die back and the fucundity of the land has passed into dryness survival mode.

It doesn’t mean that there is nothing of interest out there, I’ve often mentioned that yellow daisy-like flowers are among the hardest to identify. This one could be the rock daisy, Heterolopis, or perhaps Leysera. If I see it again which is quite likely we’ll take a closer look.

Heterolopis or Rock Daisy?

The wind continues to blow – it has been more than a week now, which is quite unusual and not a let up in the forecast. The dogs love it particularly the wolfhounds and here is Maebh standing in the wind, allowing it to stream through her coat.

Maebh poses in the evening light, letting the wind slip through her coat

Jemima Chew on the other hand finds her solace in water and the permanent streams. She loves to wallow and lie the flow and then stands up, looking about her, thoroughly pleased with herself.

Jemima Chew – life is good

As Christopher and I chatted and walked I kept my eyes open for anything new and exciting, expectations low. And here we are, hidden beneath some fynbos scrub, this exquisite pelargonium. There are nearly 300 subspecies, 150 in the fynbos region of which only 20 or so are in the book. This one is so lovely, the colours, the delicate shape of the petals. I would be tempted to move it to the garden but my fingers are not the greenest and what if it’s the only one? I only ever transplant the very common flowers, anything that might be rare, special or precious belongs on the mountain.

A Pelargonium we have not seen before

Springtime – Pelargoniums, Proteas and Polygalas

Posted on October 14, 2013 by fynbosblog Leave a comment

Last week was a bad week for running with the dogs. I’d hurt my leg and I had to go to Johannesburg on business and then when finally I was motivated to get out there, it rained. But on Friday evening friends came to do a “flower safari” and it is always wonderful to see the mountain through their eyes – the wild beauty of it and the spectacular blooming of the fynbos all the more marvellous.

Sunday morning came with glorious sunshine, the dogs’ tails were wagging in anticipation and there were no excuses or reasons to avoid an hour of excercise interspersed with photography. The morning light as the sun slants over the mountain lends itself beautifully to photos, so we were up at a reasonable hour and the four of us panted up the hill.

I probably repeat this too often, but although this is the 42nd blog this year, I have seen something completely new every single time I’ve been up the mountain and I know I’ve missed flowers as well. Shrubs tend to bloom for a while, but flowering bulbs sometimes have only a brief moment of glory and the saddest thing is to come back from a trip, head up the moutain and see the withered shape of some lovely thing that we shan’t see again until 2014.

Yesterday we saw old friends and some completely new flowers. The first to greet us was this coral-pink protea. The buds have been there for ages and the anticipation was worth the wait when it finally bloomed. It could be Protea eximia, the large leaves with a distinctive border and the black tips of the outer petals seem indicative.

Protea eximia

There are quite a few of these gorgeous fluffy white flowers just below the area we call the lookout and I think it might be Stilbe vestita.

Stilbe vestita

Some flowers really create the feel of the mountain as there are prolific flowering shrubs all over the place. I should do a blog dedicated to them. I caught a lovely image of one, Oftia africana, on Sunday.

Oftia africana

This pretty blue flowering bulb has been present in the same part of the farm as the Stilbe vestita and I’m also not sure what it is. Further research will probably find it though, as I have lots of books on bulbs, but not always the time to read them before I post the blog.

This white erica is really amazing – in one small part of the farm it has taken over and at this time of year there is a carpet of tiny white blooms – spectacular. It’s a flat Erica that grows close to the ground.

Spreading white erica

The white Erica in close up

Another Erica we love to see is this one. It resembles several in the books, most closely abietina which one of my books says grows only on Table Mountain. A close relation perhaps? In any case it seems to flower for most of the year, with a brief break only over the worst of the winter months.

An Erica related to abietina?

From time to time I post a photograph of the many Pelargoniums on our slopes, they are prolific, there is a variety of subspecies but not that I can identify for certain.

Pelargonium

Strangely the same is true for this gladioli. You really would think that something so very common and prolific would be easy to identify. I often struggle with gladioli and for this one I have been through the Encyclopedia of Cape Bulbs several times. The flowers are pink when in bud and turn pure white as they flower. On the bottom petals there is a hint of yellow. They are prolific and flower everywhere the slopes are damp.

Gladiolus – strangely unidentified

A while ago I posted a blog entitled The Red Protea, fascinated by these red “flowers” that were growing on a protea bush. It turns out that it’s the new growth of the lovely Protea nitida (see the Protea page for a picture of the lovely Protea nitida in full bloom). Here is the very beginning of that new growth – it does indeed look like a flower in bud.

The new growth of Protea nitida

This flower, growing on a damp road right at the very top of the farm is clearly a member of the pea family, though unidentified at present.

Another member of the pea family is Polygala. There are quite a few of these and I’m not sure which one we have here but they are prolific in quite a few areas of the farm during the spring months. The little white fringe confirms the identification as Polygala.

Polygala

Finally, also at the top of the farm, we saw the first flower of Scabiosa columbaria. Part of the charm of this flower is that it can survive the hot weather and will continue to flower all the way through the summer months when not much else is happening.

Scabiosa columbaria

After the rain…

Posted on September 6, 2013 by fynbosblog Leave a comment

What a joy to be home, even though our trip was to lovely Ireland, home of many fans of The Fynbos Blog. On the evening we got back what a lovely sight greeted us in the grass just above the house – glittering with hundreds of snowy white stars of Gheissorhiza ovata. They are flowering in profusion after the rain. While I was in Ireland I got a new lens for my iphone camera that allows better close-ups and this is the first result.

Geissorhiza ovata

To get a better idea of the shape of this charming and profilic flowering bulb here is the whole plant.

Geissorhiza ovata

This pelargonium grows by the road just above the house. We didn’t have to go far to find new things. As usual with Pelargonium I don’t know the subspecies though we love them and have sucessfully transplanted quite a few into the garden.

Pelargonium – subspecies unknown

This small dam is known as James’s Lake – we created it in my father’s memory and it looked lovely in the evening light.

James’s Lake

Jemima Chew and Maebh went hunting in this field of buchu scattered with fynbos just behind James’s Lake. One of the joys of farming a fynbos plant like buchu is that it flourishes best when it grows with it’s fynbos friends and though we have to stop them from taking over the buchu, the lands are fully of wild plants as well as those we’ve cultivated.

Jemima Chew and Maebh hunting in the buchu lands

A spell of good weather and a burst of new flowers

Posted on August 10, 2013 by fynbosblog Leave a comment

It has been a gorgeous week on the mountain, with new flowers popping up all over the place. We had a damp start and one morning when it was too wet to run but the dogs and I have had several stunning runs all over the farm and this morning’s weather is glorious so as soon as this blog is finished we’ll be out there again. Next week we are expecting a big storm and our running might be curtailed, so this weekend we are keen to do as much as possible. Poor Jemima Chew is limping and on anti-inflammatories so she can’t come and howls in outrage when we leave. They would go in any weather; for my part I don’t mind the damp mist at all but the pouring rain is not my thing.

Talking of being rained under I’m deluged with work at the moment so haven’t had much time for research. Luckily some things just jump out of the book – instantly and clearly recognisable and this is one of them. Oftia africana, widely dispersed throughout the Cape and apparently flowers all year round though seems to prefer the spring flowering here on the mountain. it is coming out all over the place.

Oftia

Pelargoniums and Babinias are also everywhere, the latter flowering decorously in groups under trees and the former peeping out from thick undergrowth along the roads.

As we climbed up the mountain we saw this Erica with tiny white bells on it, despite my best efforts you can only just see them in this picture. The same variety seems to come with pink bells as well and sometimes they grow side by side

Erica with tiny white bell-like flowers

I can’t find this shrub with a yellow flower in the book so its gone to the unknown album and I’m hoping to get to Kirstenbosch Botannical Gardens this week or next to get some help with these and possibly some additional reference books in preparation for the continued spring explosion.

Unidentified yellow flowering fynbos shrub

There is no difficulty recognising the Microloma tenuifolium, it’s tiny bright coral flowers jump out of the tangled thickets at you. Normally you see them like this one curling and creeping around a wild helichrysum.

Microloma tenuifolia

But yesterday we saw this unusual sight, the Microloma has gone and wound itself round and round this bit of bush and is flowering as a massive head of colour. Amazing!

Microloma tenuiffolia

The Lobostemum continues to blossom all over the mountain, often they are pink, or pinky-blue. In this particular area at the top of the farm they are all blue.

Lebostemum with blue flowers

Finally as we ran down the mountain we came across this magnificent Lucodendrum. Later in the spring these yellow flowers will turn the most beautiful shade of coral. There are masses of them and we look forward to their arrival at the height of spring.

Leucodendrum

Sunsets and Pelargonium

Posted on July 3, 2013 by fynbosblog 2 comments

This morning’s surprise is this lovely Pelargonium. When I’ve had a series of new sightings I’m not necessarily expecting something new every time I go up on the mountain and I’m delighted when we (the dogs and I) come across some enchanting flower waving its petals at us in the dawn light. This is another of the mysterious Pelargoniums – I was so pleased to see this one, and thought we must be able to identify it, it’s so clear and distinctive. Well, I must tell you it is not in the book and a visit to Kirstenbosch with the hopes of a specialised book on Pelargoniums (or is it Perlargonia?) is on the cards very soon. This doesn’t appear to be in the rather good Fynbos Field Guide where 24, presumably of the most common, of the 150 fynbos subspieces occur. This farm is a source of lots of different sub-spieces of Pelargonium and Ericas. I will catalogue them and maybe work through them over time…

The farm sits on an East West Axis, and from here, 70 km away through the clear air, we see Table Mountain, behind which the sun sets in the spring and autumn months. Some nights, at any time of the year, the sun floods the mountains behind us with pink light. It’s not every night, in fact it’s not common at all. Last night I was working away at my desk when an instinct brought me out to look at the light – sure enough, pink mountains. I grabbed the iphone, ran to the dam wall, pursued by delighted dogs, and took this photo. We’ll see have better and pinker mountains to come, but this is the first I’ve captured for the blog. It’s about the flowers, but it’s not all about the flowers.