Willem is a wildlife artist based in South Africa. He says "My aim is simply to express the beauty and wonder that is in Nature, and to heighten people's appreciation of plants, animals and the wilderness. Not everything I paint is African! Though I've never been there, I'm also fascinated by Asia and I've done paintings of Asian rhinos and birds as well. I may in future do some of European, Australian and American species too. I'm fascinated by wild things from all over the world! I mainly paint in watercolours. . . but actually many media including 'digital' paintings with the computer!"

Here's an outing I haven't reported yet. On the 24th of April, 2024, a bunch of us had a nice day outing for an event called the City Nature Challenge. This was a worldwide endeavour to get city folks out into nature to see how much biodiversity they could find for that day. Our group was mostly students from the University of Limpopo, plus my friend Bronwyn Egan, who curates the herbarium at the university, local botanist Kamogelo Solomon Modimola (Solly), and myself. We were a sizeable group, and it's always great to see young folks appreciating nature.

There's much that is a bit funny about the place we went to. Basically where we started from, is a turnoff from the main road between Polokwane and Haenertsburg, called the 'Randfontein turnoff'. It is a dirt road, and the funny thing is, I don't know of any actual place called Randfontein that is on that road, or anywhere near it. The only Randfontein I know, and the only one Google Maps shows, is a town and region to the west of Johannesburg, which is very far away from here. So . . . apart from not really knowing why that turnoff has that particular name, it doesn't look promising from the main road. The road turns off into a region that from the outside looks very degraded . . . lots of non-native plant species like black wattle, blackwood, bugweed and the like. But above this, some grassy hills can be seen. There are no fences or indication of whom the land belongs to . . . it might be someone connected with the Zion Church, which is based in Zion City Moria nearby, or to some farmer. We just went, had a leisurely hike, and didn't make or encounter any trouble.

So, we started down where the veld was very poor-looking, but then, after we penetrated the dense thickets of alien plant growth, we emerged into what was actually a quite pristine and scenic hilly landscape! Here you see a photo. The habitat was mainly grassland, with here and there thickets or individual trees, and even in some of the more sheltered spots, patches of closed-canopy evergreen forest. All was set for a fine day's exploration! In the event, I mostly focused on plants, although there were also some birds around, and a few reptiles, and many insects, most of which were hard to identify as typical in this country with its huge diversity of invertebrates and no complete field guides.

The nice thing was that this area gets somewhat more rain than Polokwane, and the veld was still quite green even though we were well into the Autumn. Also, we found a surprisingly large number of flowers! So here I present to you a few of the prettier ones we found.

We found several nice individuals of this little Babiana bainesii. This is a member of the iris family. The genus is distinguished by the flowers being borne at ground level rather than high up on a flowering stalk as with most irises. The majority of Babiana species occur in the Western Cape, with only a couple reaching Limpopo. They are known as 'bobbejaantjies' or 'little baboons'. I'd like to know what animals or insects pollinate them; there must be something about the fact that they bear the flowers so low.

Babiana bainesii	Crassula alba

This pretty cluster of red flowers belongs to Crassula alba, which ironically means 'white crassula'. In truth, this species can have white, yellow, orange or red flowers, and some variants have red-speckled, fleshy leaves also. Crassulas are very diverse in South Africa, ranging from tiny, hardly-succulent herbs to very fleshy shrubs and even a few that become small, succulent trees.

Dicliptera clinopodia is an attractive, small shrub, in the Acanthus family. This family is not particularly diverse here, but almost all the species are quite striking and interesting. We found these in thickets and at the edge of forest, in positions of light to moderate shade.

Dicliptera	Gladiolus

This lovely Gladiolus ferrugineus is another member of the Iris family. Many gardeners will know Gladioli . . . there are many hybrids and cultivars being grown in gardens all over the world. Their parents come from South Africa, the home of the Gladiolus, with a couple of hundred different species! Other species grow in other countries, but most of them are native here. Most are fairly small and humble, but very pretty if you go in for a close look, and this one is no exception.

The daisy family is abundant and ultra-diverse all over South Africa. In mountain grassland, the dominant genus is Helichrysum or Everlastings. This one is Helichrysum chrysargyrum which means "Sun-gold silver-yellow", alluding to its golden-yellow flowers and silvery grey leaves. What you see here, is that it bears its flowers in twice-compound heads: the entire head is composed of many small flowerheads that each consist of many small, individual flowers. Compound flowers are typical of the daisy family, which indeed is named the Compositae.

Helichrysum	Kalanchoe

These lovely little orange flowers belong to another succulent member of the Crassula family. It is Kalanchoe klopperae, a recently-recognized species that used to be included in the very widespread Kalanchoe rotundifolia. We found them growing in shade on the edge and even in the interior of patches of forest. Some kalanchoes from South Africa and Madagascar are very popular worldwide as succulents for rock gardens or pots.

These Macledium zeyheri-flowers also belong to the daisy family. They're called 'Doll's Proteas' for their resemblance to the flowers of Proteas, which are an entirely different family, but also with composite flowers. The spiky bracts you see here are quite hard and sharp.

Macledium	Moraea

We found yet another member of the Iris family, the lovely yellow Moraea moggii. These flowers have very delicate petals that easily get damaged, so I had to look around a bit before I found an intact flower. These pretty plants can be danger to farmers with livestock, since their leaves and bulbs are very poisonous. Actual wild antelopes are smart enough not to eat them!

We found these beautiful flowers of, perhaps, Pavonia collumella (certainly a Pavonia but I'm not sure of the species) right at the start of our outing. This was a large shrub covered in hundreds of delicate pink flowers, with dewdrops beautifying them even further! They are members of the Hibiscus family, which is widespread in South Africa though not mega-diverse. They're all quite charming to see in flower in the wild.

Pavonia	Xerophyta

Finally, here's a picture of a Xerophyta, maybe villosa. The genus name means 'dry plant', and at least some are quite drought resistant. In the dry season, they lose all their leaves, with only the black, fibrous stems left standing. These fibres protect the sensitive growing tissues from desiccation and from grass fires (which is why they are blackened). We call them 'bobbejaanstert' or 'baboon's tail' in Afrikaans. They have surprisingly showy flowers, as you can see here!

That wraps up this report! We found many other things besides, and I hope we will return there soon, perhaps at a different time of the year.

Willem

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