Roridula gorgonias | |
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photo: Tony Rebelo | |
Scientific classification | |
Kingdom: | Plantae |
Clade: | Tracheophytes |
Clade: | Angiosperms |
Clade: | Eudicots |
Clade: | Asterids |
Order: | Ericales |
Family: | Roridulaceae |
Genus: | Roridula |
Species: | R. gorgonias |
Binomial name | |
Roridula gorgonias Planch. (1848) | |
Synonyms | |
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Roridula gorgonias is an evergreen, shyly branching, upright shrub of up to about 1 m (3 ft) high, from the family Roridulaceae. It has awl-shaped leaves with entire margins, crowded at the tip of the branches. These are set with tentacles that secrete a sticky, shiny resin from the thicker gland at their tips, that catch many airborne items. At the center of the shoots appear inflorescences between July and October that consist of up to twelve flowers in spikes, each on a short flower stalk, with a bract at its base. The 5-merous flower is about 2½ cm (1 in) in diameter and has pinkish purple or white petals. The plants do not digest the trapped insects, but the bug Pameridea roridulae sucks out their juices and the plant absorbs nutrients from the bug's droppings. It is therefore considered a protocarnivorous plant. It is called Gorgons dewstick, [1] fly bush or fly catcher bush in English and vliebos, or vlieëbossie in Afrikaans. [2] (but these names are also used for its relative R. dentata ). R. gorgonias is an endemic species home to the southwest of the Western Cape province of South Africa.
Gorgons dewstick is a slender shrub growing up to 60–100 cm high. It has fairly stout brownish stems, that show conspicuous horizontal leaf scars. The leaves are crowded at the tip of the branches, the youngest upright, but the leaf base steadily bending down until eventually fully reflexed. When a shoot has flowered, it dies off, but produces side shoots below the old inflorescences. The leaves are set alternately and lack both stipules and leaf stalk. The leaf blade is line-shaped, up to 12 cm (6 in) long and ½ cm (0.2 in) wide, tapering towards the tip. It has an entire margin, that carries many with long tentacles topped by teardrop-shaped glands. The upper surface of the leaves is covered with much smaller, shorter tentacles intermingled with white hairs. The lower surface of the leaves is hairless but the on the raised mid-vein is a row of short tentacles. The flowers are set in a spike with a terminal flower, and may consist of up to twelve star-symmertical flowers, each on a short flower stalk with a bract at its base. [3]
Byblis is a small genus of carnivorous plants, sometimes termed the rainbow plants for the attractive appearance of their mucilage-covered leaves in bright sunshine. Native to Australia and New Guinea, it is the only genus in the family Byblidaceae. The first species in the genus was described by the English botanist Richard Anthony Salisbury in 1808. Eight species are now recognised.
Roridula is a genus of evergreen, insect-trapping shrubs, with two species, of about 1⅓–2 m. It is the only genus in the family Roridulaceae. It has thin, woody, shyly branching, upright, initially brown, later grey stems, with lance- to awl-shaped leaves crowded at their tips. The star-symmetrical flowers consist from the outside in of five, green or reddish, free sepals, alternating with five white, pink or purple, free petals. Further to the middle and opposite the sepals are five stamens with the anthers initially kinked down. These suddenly flip up if the nectar-containing swelling at its base is being touched. The center of the flower is occupied by a superior ovary. The leaves and sepals carry many sticky tentacles of different sizes, that trap insects. Roridula does not break down the insect proteins, but bugs of the genus Pameridea prey on the trapped insects. These later deposit their feces on the leaves, which take up nutrients from the droppings. The species can be found in the Western Cape province of South Africa. They are commonly known as dewstick or fly bush in English and vlieëbos or vlieëbossie in Afrikaans.
This page provides a glossary of plant morphology. Botanists and other biologists who study plant morphology use a number of different terms to classify and identify plant organs and parts that can be observed using no more than a handheld magnifying lens. This page provides help in understanding the numerous other pages describing plants by their various taxa. The accompanying page—Plant morphology—provides an overview of the science of the external form of plants. There is also an alphabetical list: Glossary of botanical terms. In contrast, this page deals with botanical terms in a systematic manner, with some illustrations, and organized by plant anatomy and function in plant physiology.
Mimetes chrysanthus is an evergreen, upright shrub of 1½–2 m high that has been assigned to the family Proteaceae. It has green, slightly stalked oval leaves of 3–4½ cm (1.2–1.8 in) long and 1–1¾ cm (0.4–0.7 in) wide. The inflorescences are near the tip of the branches, cylinder-shaped and consist of 50–70 densely cropped flower heads, each in the axil of a green leaf, consisting of 25–35 golden yellow, faintly sweet scented flowers. It is endemic to the Fynbos ecoregion of South Africa and is found in two locations, in the Western Cape province. The flowering season is from March to May or June, but flower heads sometimes occur in any other part of the year.
Mimetes cucullatus is an evergreen shrub with several, mostly not branching, upright stems of 1–2 m (3–7 ft) high, that has been assigned to the family Proteaceae. It is the most widespread and most common pagoda species that can cope with a relatively large range of environmental circumstances. It is known under several names including common pagoda in English and rooistompie in Afrikaans.
Pachyphytum is a small genus of succulents in the family Crassulaceae, native to Mexico, at elevations from 600 to 1,500 metres. The name comes from the ancient Greek pachys (=thick) and phyton (=plant) because of the shape of the leaves.
Leucospermum truncatulum is a slender, upright, evergreen, hardly branching shrub of up to 2 m (6 ft) high, with felty inverted egg-shaped to oval, leaves with entire margins of 1–2½ cm (0.4–1.0 in) long and ½–1 cm (0.2–0.4 in) wide. It has small globe-shaped, at first yellow, later pinkish flower heads of 1½–2 cm (0.6-0.8 in) in diameter, without a stalk, usually crowded with two to eight together near the end of the stems. It is known as oval-leaf pincushion in English, and patrysbos or kleinkopspeldekussing in Afrikaans. It is an endemic species of the south of the Western Cape province of South Africa, and flowers between August and December.
Mimetes hottentoticus is an evergreen, upright shrub of 1½–3 m (5–10 ft) high from the family Proteaceae. It has silvery, broadly egg-shaped to egg-shaped leaves with three small teeth crowded at the tip. The flower heads and subtending leaves form a cylindric inflorescence, topped with a tuft of smaller, more or less upright silvery or pinkish leaves. Each flowerhead contains 8–12 flowers with conspicuously red styles, that are all parallel, projected straight up, pushing against the leaf subtending the higher flowerhead. The styles end in a short white zone topped by a thick blackish pollen presenter. Flowers can usually be found from January till March, few may persist into May. It is called silver pagoda or matchstick pagoda in English and Hottentotstompie in Afrikaans.
Mimetes palustris or cryptic pagoda is an evergreen shrub, assigned to the family Proteaceae. It has horizontal sprawling shoots as well as upright, unbranched shoots usually about ½ m (1½ in) high. The leaves are entire and stand out on the lower parts of the shoots, but are overlapping and pressed tightly against each other near the inflorescence, almost like a snakeskin. The inflorescence consists of several flowerheads, each containing three clear yellow flowers that are longer than the subtending leaves. It is the smallest species of Mimetes and is an endemic species that grows on well-drained, but permanently moist sandy and peaty slopes in the mountains near Hermanus, Western Cape province of South Africa. It is considered critically endangered. Flowering occurs all year round, but peaks in August and September.
Mimetes pauciflorus, the three-flowered pagoda, is an evergreen, shyly branching, upright shrub of 2–4 (6½–13 ft) high, from the family Proteaceae. It has narrowly to broadly oval leaves of 2½–4 cm (1.0–1.6 in) long and ¾–2 cm (0.3–0.8 in) wide, on the upper parts of the branches, the lower parts leafless with a reddish brown bark. The inflorescences at the top of the shoots are cylinder-shaped, 10–40 cm (4–16 in) long and contain forty to one hundred twenty densely crowded flower heads, at a steep upward angle, hiding a crest of very small, almost vertical leaves. The flower heads each consist of three, rarely four individual flowers. The flowers are tightly enclosed by four or five orange-yellow, fleshy, pointy, lance-shaped involucral bracts, and three orange-yellow, 4–5½ cm (1.6–2.4 in) long bracteoles. It grows on always moist, south-facing slopes in the southern coastal mountains of South Africa. Flowers can be found from August to November, with a peak in September.
Mimetes saxatilis or limestone pagoda is an evergreen, upright, rarely branching shrub of 1–2¼ m (3⅓–7¼ ft) high, assigned to the family Proteaceae. The approximately oval leaves are 3½–5 cm (1.4–2.0 in) long and 1½–3 cm (0.6–1.2 in) wide with a blunt, thickened, reddish tip or with three crowded teeth. It has cylinder-shaped inflorescences topped by a crest of green leaves, further consisting of heads with 12-22 individual bright yellow flowers, each in the axil of a flat, green leaf. It is an endemic species that is restricted to limestone outcrops in the Agulhas plains in the very south of the Western Cape province of South Africa. It is considered an endangered species. Flowering may occur between July and December, but is unreliable in its timing, dependent on sufficient moisture availability.
Mimetes argenteus is an evergreen, upright, hardly branching, large shrub of about 2 m (6½ ft) high in the family Proteaceae. It has elliptic, silvery leaves, due to a dense covering of silky hairs, that stand out a right angle from the branches. It has cylindric inflorescences of 8–15 cm (3–6 in) long and 10–12 cm (4–5 in) in diameter, crested by smaller silvery pink leaves at an upright angle. These consist of many flower heads, each containing six to nine individual flowers and ar set in the axil of a leaf flushed mauve to carmine. It flowers from March to June. The silver pagoda naturally occurs in the Western Cape province of South Africa. It is called silver pagoda or silver-leaved bottlebrush in English and vaalstompie in Afrikaans.
Mairia crenata is a perennial herbaceous plant of mostly 2–15 cm (1–6 in) high that is assigned to the family Asteraceae. It has a woody rootstock of up to 5 cm (2 in) long, from which brown, fleshy roots develop. The five to eighteen, hard and leathery, spoon-shaped leaves are in one to three rosettes, have a distinct main vein, blunt or pointy tip, often dark red or blackish margins with rounded teeth and a ½–2 cm (0.2–0.8 in) long stalk-like foot, often initially somewhat woolly hairy, on particularly the lower surface and the main vein, but this is easily rubbed off the shiny surfaces. Each rosette produces mostly one, sometimes up to four, mostly rusty or whitish woolly hairy, brown or dark red inflorescence stalks, usually 1½–15 cm long, each with two to eight, initially woolly, line-shaped to oval bracts, the lowest up to 3 cm (1.2 in), decreasing size further up, and carrying mostly one, rarely up to three flower heads. The flower heads have a bell-shaped involucre with about 40 bracts, sixteen to thirty three violet to white ray florets of about 1¼–1⅞ cm long, and many yellow disc florets. The species flowers anywhere between February and December but only after a fire has destroyed the overhead biomass or serious disturbance. It is an endemic species that is restricted to the Eastern Cape and Western Cape provinces of South Africa.
Mairia hirsuta is a tufted perennial, herbaceous plant of up to 40 cm high, that is assigned to the family Asteraceae. Most of its narrow to broad elliptic or inverted egg-shaped leaves are part of the basal rosette, have margin that is rolled under, with rounded or pointy teeth or with some peg-like extensions, lightly woolly on the upper surface and densely woolly on the underside, but always the green remains visible. Flower heads have been found from July to November, mostly after a fire or when the soil has been disturbed. The species can be found in the southern mountains of the Western Cape province of South Africa.
Felicia clavipilosa is an upright, richly branched shrub of up to 60 cm (2 ft) high, that is assigned to the family Asteraceae. It has alternately arranged leaves, and flower heads with 3–4 whorls of involucral bracts with many yellow disc florets in the centre. Very characteristic for the species are the short club-shaped hairs on its fruits. There are two subspecies. Subsp. clavipilosa has narrowly lance-shaped entire leaves with one vein and pale mauve ray florets. Subspecies transvaalensis has lance-shaped leaves with one or three veins and white ray florets. The species occurs in southern Africa, with subsp. clavipilosa having a western distribution in Zambia, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Botswana and South Africa, and subsp. transvaalensis restricted to the east, from Zimbabwe, through Botswana to South Africa. The subspecies transvaalensis is sometimes called pokkiesblom in Afrikaans.
Olearia adenolasia, commonly known as woolly-glandular daisy-bush, is a species of flowering plant in the family Asteraceae. It is a small upright shrub with sticky leaves and blue-purple or white daisy flowers.
Salix annulifera is a small shrub from the genus of the willow (Salix) with up to 8 centimeter long leaf blades. The natural range of the species is in China.
Salix dissa is a low shrub from the genus willow (Salix) with usually 1 to 3 centimeters long leaf blades. The natural range of the species is in China.
Otholobium saxosum is a small shrublet of up to 20 cm (7.9 in) high that has been assigned to the Pea family, with branches upright or horizontal at the base with rising tips. It has sessile, clover-like leaves and white, pea-like flowers that grow in triplets in the axils of the upper leaves of new, short side shoots. The species is only known from Garcia's Pass in Western Cape province of South Africa. Flowering occurs in October and November.
Otholobium lucens is a shrub of up to 60 cm (24 in) high that is assigned to the pea family. It has alternately set clover-like leaves crowding on the new growth, while older parts have lost their leaves. The white, pea-like flowers occur with 3 or 6 together in the leaf axils. This rare species is an endemic of the Swartberg mountains in the Western Cape province of South Africa. It flowers between July and February.