| South Africa's large areas of semi-desert scrub | | | | Carpet of flowers: |
| and grassland might suggest a certain poverty of | | | | The Cape in the spring is a breathtaking sight, but |
| plant life. Aside from the fact that a tract of | | | | even more astonishing is Namaqualand. Dry, rocky |
| pristine grassland can hold up to 60 grass species, | | | | and desert-like for the rest of the year, it yields |
| nothing could be further from the truth. | | | | its floral wealth for a short few weeks in the |
| There are five major habitat types in South | | | | spring in dazzling sheets of colour. |
| Africa: fynbos, forest, Karoo, grassland, and | | | | The golden yellow and orange Namaqualand |
| savannah. The country can also be divided into | | | | daisies are predominant, but in between them are |
| seven biomes, or ecological life zones, with distinct | | | | a wide variety of flowers, including the iridescent |
| environmental conditions and related sets of plant | | | | succulent mesembryanthemums. Colours here are |
| and animal life: Nama Karoo, succulent Karoo, | | | | particularly intense, although there is also much |
| fynbos, forest, thicket, savanna, and grassland. | | | | fascination in less colourful species such as the |
| Whichever classification is used, some 10% of the | | | | quiver tree (the San, or Bushmen, used to make |
| world's flowering species are found in South | | | | quivers from its fibrous stem) and the |
| Africa, the only country in the world with an | | | | bizarre-looking tall succulent known as the |
| entire plant kingdom inside its borders: the Cape | | | | halfmens (half human). |
| Floristic Kingdom, which contains 8 600 species, | | | | And anyone interested in plants' abilitiesto adapt to |
| 68% of them endemic. The Cape Peninsula alone | | | | harsh circumstances in a myriad different ways |
| boasts more plant species than the whole of | | | | (not all are succulents) need not wait for spring to |
| Great Britain. | | | | visit the area. |
| Fynbos: | | | | Forests: |
| This southwestern area of South Africa is the | | | | Although South Africa has more than a thousand |
| home of the fynbos, which is composed of ericas | | | | indigenous trees, large species are relatively |
| (heathers), proteas and the grass-like restios. | | | | scarce in many parts of the country. |
| Most spectacular in flower are the proteas, which | | | | But they are very much at home in some areas, |
| include the king protea - the national flower - and | | | | such as the Knysna-Tsitsikamma forest with its |
| others of broadly similar shape, the pincushion | | | | tall stinkwoods, black ironwoods and yellowwoods, |
| leucospermum types and spiky leucadendrons. | | | | and the northeastern region in Mpumalanga and |
| The colour range is vast. | | | | Limpopo, home to the ancient cycads and |
| The ericas, the largest genus of flowering plants in | | | | Lowveld species such as the fever tree - so |
| South Africa, are more delicate, repaying close | | | | called because of its association with malaria |
| examination of their almost infinite variety of | | | | areas. |
| colour and form. One or other of these species | | | | It is also in the north that one finds the famous |
| will be found in bloom at almost any time of the | | | | thick-stemmed baobab, which according to African |
| year. | | | | myth was accidentally planted upside down, |
| These share their Cape home with such beauties | | | | accounting for the odd shape of its branches. |
| as the red disa orchid, one of South Africa's 550 | | | | Then there are the forests of KwaZulu-Natal, |
| wild orchids, which grows in the mountains, as well | | | | where the beautiful shade-loving orange Clivia |
| as numerous irises, pelargoniums and many more. | | | | miniata, a now much cultivated member of the |
| South Africa's pelargoniums, in particular, have | | | | amaryllis family, is found. |
| contributed greatly to gardens all over the world, | | | | Another popular orange (and purple) garden |
| as have the arum lilies - the classic white species | | | | flower, now the emblem of the US city of Los |
| is from this area, the yellow and pink from | | | | Angeles, originates in the Eastern Cape: the |
| elsewhere in the country. | | | | strelitzia. In much the same colour range, South |
| The world's gardens also have South Africa to | | | | Africa's winters are marked by the flowering of |
| thank for the agapanthus, gladiolus, Barberton | | | | some of the country's 140 species of aloes. |
| daisy and Gardenia thunbergia, to name a few. | | | | |