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And here are my dad's comments...

1. Chrysanthemoides monilifera, common name "bitou bush." It's also known as the tickberry bush, because it has bluish fruits that look like large fat ticks.

2. "Some type of daisy." (Sorry, that's all I could get out of him )

3. "Some type of daisy," he said again. These are common garden plants, so I'll have a look for one the next time I'm at a garden centre.

4. Gazania sp.

Hope that helps, arks!

WOW, restio!!! Many, many thanks to you and your Dad, all this info is fascinating. I'm really going to have to get myself a Cape flora book next time I'm there, because I'm always wondering about the plants when I'm out and about.

Don't worry about those daisies as I'll admit that I took those pix in a garden (at Suikerbossie ), but even in gardens, I'm never sure what are just garden plants and what are indigenous wildflowers. Also, many plants, particularly daisy types, that grow wild in SA are sold as bedding plants or houseplants here in the USA.

It's so great having you (and your Dad), JB and Imberbe able to help out here and I hope other forumites will find these discussions as interesting as I do. All these smaller things — plants and bugs and reptiles and more — add so much to the full experience of nature and the parks. The more time I spend, the more curious I've become, plus I suppose that once you've seen the big things and are no longer concentrating so intensely on seeing lions and rhino and such, you begin to notice more (and more) of the smaller things.

Thanks again to all of you for participating!! I'll be posting the first of my KNP mysteries over the weekend

PS: Sorry about the pic/pix that aren't opening, tinypic isn't as reliable as it once was (perhaps because so many are now using it?), but it sure is easy I've encountered the same no-open problems with both my pix and those in others reports — and not all are hosted by tinypic. I wonder whether it's also that with newer cameras, image size has increased enormously just over the past few months? And even with re-sizing .... (Far too technical a concept for my non-techie brain )

PPS: I was able to find both those daisies by searching on family Asteraceae on the PlantzAfrica database. So thanks for pointing me in the right direction on that. Often it only takes having a bit of the right name/info to get to the specific, although that didn't work for the ericas

Jay has also been doing some sleuthing on these (since some of the pix wouldn't open for her, I emailed them to her ) and she has come up with some further info.

The bottom on in the post of the various erics, the one I'd thought might be erica hirtiflora, Jay says is erica longiaristata. Anyone else want to comment?

Jay also confirmss that #3 in the first post is a Limonium, and more specifically that it is limonium peregrinum, the dune rose.

And #4 of of the yellow flowers post is specifically a butter flower, gazania lichtensteinii.

Thanks, Jay, for contributing to the sleuthing here!

My own further sleuthing on those daisies indicates that #2 is wild cineraria (cineraria saxifraga) and #3 is golden daisy bush (euryops chrysanthemoides).

This sleuthing is beginning to get obsessive!!

For those who did not know: these trees came from Mexico. It was planted on the mines, on the instruction of sir Cecil John Rhodes, as the other tree species were destroyed for firewood. These trees (same as tamboti) gives you a "nasty" stomach if used to cook food.

I was in the Cape in 2007 during flower season and took lots of pix at Cape Point, WCNP, Kirstenbosch and at the farm where I stayed in Darling, which has its own wildflower reserve. I'm hoping that as these flowers are IDed, we can add the best and most interesting of them to the Plants Forum index. MarkWildDog made a great start with collecting and indexing pix and info on plants and trees, but since he's been inactive, there has been little activity here in the Plants Forum. I can't be the only parks' visitor who is interested in plants?!?

1. Saw this little daisy along the Darling Hills Road, September 2007.


2. This beautiful old tree is at Waylands Farm and I've no idea what it might be.


3. I saw this particular flower in the garden at Waylands, but have also seen it (or something very similar?) growing wild.

1. Dimorphotheca spp - but a rather ragged looking one. In spring, these daisies make a display of blinding snowfield white. Not sure which Dimorphotheca it is. Plantzafrica has D. ecklonis and D. pluvialis.

2. The tree is a Pepper Tree (Schinus molle). It's an introduced species, but they are lovely.

3. Scabiousa africana - indigenous.

The tiny blue flowers are forget-me-nots.

Thanks restio for both the IDs and the links! I also saw the scabiosa africana at Cape Point and Kirstenbosch. And I'd never have guessed that that big old tree was a pepper tree, as the only other one I've seen (at Groote Post) looked very different indeed. I agree it's an attractive tree, too bad it's an alien

I did some googling on Dimorphotheca and am wondering whether these two, seen in Postberg, WCNP, on 28 September 2007, are Dimorphotheca sinuata?


I love the PlantzAfrica website!

arks, the one on the right does look like D. sinuata. The pix on PlantzAfrica don't show the leaves, so it's hard to be sure.

The plant on the left is a different species to the one on the right, I think. (Check the leaves). I think it may be Ursinia cakilefolia which is described as having fine, carrot-like leaves.

Have a look at the centre of the flowers - according to PlantzAfrica:

Thanks, restio! Upon further googling, I'm wondering whether the one on the right might be Arctotheca calendula aka Cape weed?

I agree that the one on the left may be Ursinia cakilefolia, altho the PlantsAfrica info says its WC range ends around Redelinghuys, which is somewhat farther north than Darling — took me a while to find that small dorp on my map!! I also made a mistake, as I saw these particular flowers in Darling, before I went off to Postberg. So in fact while the Ursinia occurs wild a bit farther north, it could easily have been planted in Darling?

In fact, I saw the yellow flowers in this garden in Darling


and the orange ones growing alongside the Darling Museum.


In googling around, I also found I what looks to be a good source of pix for ID. I recognise quite a few of my mystery flowers amongst these pix — assuming the IDs are correct.

arks, I think that Asteraceae (daisies) are quite hard to identify, but at least we're making some headway. I'm usually happy if I can get as far as the genera.

That site you found looks really good - at least as a starting point to suggest possible IDs.

Thanks, restio! I agree that those daisies are rather like LBJs — very foncusing!

Here are some more flora that I saw whilst exploring Darling.

1. I think that this one is red everlasting (Helichrysum sanguineum)?


2. I think this may just be a type of butterfly bush (buddleia), altho at the time I had decided that it wasn't ... The little flowers seem to be more widely spaced on the spray that I've seen with buddleias?


3. I've no idea what this tree might be?

arks, #1 is some type of vygie (Mesembryanthemacae). Have a look at the PlantzAfrica entry.

2 looks like a Buddleia, I must say. Looks similar to B. auriculata.

Thanks yet again, restio. I think I was looking at the wrong "leaves" for #1 and your suggestion for #2 seems spot on. Any ideas on the tree with the pretty berries?

Hi Arks, I don't think that's Helichrysum sanguinem, that looks
more like these photos:
http://flickr.com/search/?q=Helichrysum ... neum&w=all

It could be some kind of garden cultivar, Helichrysum bracteatum perhaps?

I have a mystery plant from the Swartberg pass, anyone know what this one is?
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2188/236 ... 902e_m.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3161/236 ... e793_m.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3222/236 ... 114d_m.jpg
img]http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3222/2361447211_829545114d_b.jpg[/img]

Googled a bit further and now think that my red flowers are Drosanthemum speciosum.

Sorry, Neil, I've no clue what your plant is, only the seedpod sure looks like our milkweed pods? It's very pretty! Perhaps it's an African sort of milkweed?