Sendelingsdrift nature garden, Richtersveld

By Roxanne Reid
I’ve always looked at Sendelingsdrift in the /Ai/Ais-Richtersveld Transfrontier Park as a place to be endured on the way to the excitements of Akkedis Pass, Domrogh Pass, Potjiespram, De Hoop and the wilderness camps inside the park. On a recent visit I discovered a reason to love your stopover here – the new Sendelingsdrift nature garden and herbarium.

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We could hardly believe the changes that had taken place there since our last visit in July 2013. Previously, we’d kept away from the campsite, a desolate and ramshackle place – especially in contrast to the sweet little air-conditioned chalets overlooking the river. But now we discovered that the campsite had been cleaned up was looking chipper, no longer a place to be avoided. 

Neat paths and rockeries are now a feature of Sendelingsdrift camp

Even better was the nature garden and herbarium, started just a few months after our 2013 visit. Backing on to the campsite, it serves the triple purpose of being pretty, teaching visitors the names of some plants we might encounter in the park, and of course creating an all-important gene pool of the Richtersveld’s special plants.

This is the realm of plant fundi Pieter van Wyk and his sidekick Gavin Josop, who showed us around. 

Nursery

Medicinal garden
It’s early days yet but I loved the medicinal garden, planted with species that have been known for generations to have power to fix things like fever, headaches and stomach aches. 

The medicinal garden is still a work in progress

For added character and a touch of humour, the space is scattered with some rusted bikes, a bleached jawbone here or a gemsbok skull-and-horns there, a few sand-blasted Coke bottles, chipped enamel plates and weathered old boots planted in the sand. ​

Medicinal garden, Sendelingsdrift

Nursery and herbarium
Part of the purpose of the nursery is to nurture threatened species and replant them in the park. Eventually it will sell some succulents and there will be a picnic spot, but the most important work being done here is the creation and cataloguing of a gene bank of Richtersveld plant species. 

​Are you wondering why this is so important? Well, about 7% of Richtersveld plants are on the Red Data list of threatened species and 29% of the plants that occur here grow nowhere else on earth. 

Gavin Josop in the nursery

​Gavin showed us that in the nursery they replicate the conditions in which a specific plant grows in the wild – down to the soil, the stones, and more. They pick up soil from where the plant is found in the wild (on the fringes of the park), or put in a few pieces of shale if that’s how it was found. This is to give each plant the best chance of survival. ‘We want to create separate parts of our garden to represent separate areas of the Richtersveld, such as Paradyskloof, Helskloof, and so on,’ he said. 

Shade cloth gives the young plants the best chance of survival in the Richtersveld's extreme climate

Plant research
Pieter, who grew up in the area, spends hours and hours hiking the Richtersveld in search of plants to document. Over the past few years he has been writing an identification guide to some 1400 Richtersveld plants (hopefully to be published later this year).

We learned that on one of his forays he searched to rediscover Conophytum ernstii, which had been lost to the scientific world since the late 1980s. Although it looks very similar to another Conophytum species, Pieter recognised the distinctive white dot in the centre. ‘The species population is stable, with no threats where it lives on a small upper slope of Sandberg inside the park,’ he later confirmed.

Conophytum ernstii at the nursery

Gavin told us an interesting story about baboons and the Aloe pearsonii at Helskloof. Historic photos have shown that numbers of these plants have declined considerably over the years. When baboons were seen breaking and eating the aloes, it was thought they may be the reason for the decline. But after collecting some of the broken pieces, Pieter made an interesting discovery: 70% of the pieces – mainly the crowns – sprouted roots and carried on growing. 

Aloe pearsonii in the wild (courtesy of SANParks)

​Apparently, baboons rarely forage on the same plant the following year because they harden to protect themselves, and this makes them less delicious to baboons. The park has erected enclosures to monitor the aloes and time will tell what long-term effect the baboons have. Are they really reducing the population or in fact increasing it by creating new plants that will root and grow? Researchers are also looking at the possible effects of climate change and the local community’s sheep and goats, which are allowed to graze in the park.

Pieter van Wyk in the place he knows best

Rock garden
Next time you visit Sendelingsdrift, take some time to appreciate the rock garden in front of the nursery and herbarium. You’ll find it on the right hand side just before the campsite. Most of these plants were saved from the mine area before mining began. See how beautiful they are with a little water from the river and try to remember some of the names on the info plaques. 

Rock garden outside the nursery

Rock garden with the nursery behind the fence

Then go through the gate to explore the funky little garden of medicinal plants, the nursery and herbarium. If you’re lucky enough to find Pieter or Gavin there, they’ll be only too happy to answer your questions about their intriguing and important work.

More about the Richtersveld

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