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The Kalahari in bloom

26/4/2016

20 Comments

 
Kalahari in bloom
​By Roxanne Reid
Anyone who tells you that the Kalahari is just red sand and lions either hasn’t visited or simply wasn’t concentrating. In fact, it’s full of fascinating small creatures like whistling rats and barking geckos. After good rain in summer the dunes are dressed in a jacket of green grass and a throng of colourful flowers will just about slap you in the face. This, then, is the Kalahari in bloom.

​When we visited the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park in late summer, recent rains had painted the veld with a rainbow of flowers. As always, we loved watching big cats, meerkat and a wealth of smaller Kalahari creatures like beetles and butterflies, spiders and scorpions. But it was our flower safari that gave us the biggest kick because it doesn’t happen every year and we clearly remembered the previous summer’s brittle brownness.
Kalahari in bloom
My plant bible is Flowering Plants of the Kalahari Dunes by Noel van Rooyen with Hugo Bezuidenhout and Emmerentia de Kock (Ekotrust, 2001), bought years ago from the shop at Twee Rivieren camp. The author tells me it's currently out of print but it will be going digital sometime in the future, so watch out for it. [Update September 2019: the updated book, Flowering Plants of the Southern Kalahari by Noel and Gretel van Rooyen, is now available from [email protected], mobile +27 082 8820886.)

​My copy is dog-eared with use because once you lock down the trees, you start exploring the shrubs. Once you learn some of the shrubs, you want to identify grasses and bulbs and creepers – and so it continues. It has given us endless hours of fun – although I admit we’ve sometimes had to look up the same plants again and again before their identity becomes cemented in our brains.
Kalahari in bloom
Here in the Kgalagadi every plant – be it tree, grass, bush, bulb or creeper – has a Latin/scientific name and at least one, if not two or three Afrikaans names. But for many of them you might be hard-pressed to discover a single English common name.

Afrikaans names can be evocative. Think seeroogblom (sore eye lily), kopseerblom (headache flower), elandsertjie (eland’s pea), duifie doring (dove’s thorn) or withondebossie (white dog bush). Or they’re as simple as schoolboy logic: bloublom (blue flower), soetdoring (sweet thorn) or gifbol (poison bulb).
Kalahari in bloom
The difference rain makes - photos taken in March of different years
Some of them provide food for the Kalahari’s animals, others have medicinal uses the San have known about for more years than your great-grandfather has been alive. And I have no doubt that some are still to be discovered and documented by science.

Have a look at some of these beauties.

Driedoring / three thorn (Rhigozum trichotomum)
Kalahari in bloom
This woody and thorny shrub occurs all over the Kgalagadi although it’s apparently not very yummy for animals. The pinkish-white flowers are a different story and springbok are happy to add them to their menu. They bloom in spring or after rainfall, giving the spiky shrub a much softer appearance. In dry times, the driedoring sheds its leaves and looks dead. The San use the straight stems as arrow shafts.

Springbokopslag (Indigofera alternans)
Kalahari in bloom
Also called the skaapertjie (sheep’s pea) this creeping plant has leaves that are grey-green below and covered with little hairs. The deep-pink or reddish flowers appear from summer into autumn.
​
Wild senna / swartstormbossie (Senna italica subsp. arachoides)
Kalahari in bloom
In summer, especially after good rains, this ground creeper has bright yellow flowers with brown veins and the flowers grow upright like candles in the sand. A root infusion is used to treat stomach ailments or as a laxative, while the seeds can be used as a coffee substitute.

Devil’s thorn / dubbeltjie (Tribulus zeyheri)
Kalahari in bloom
Tierkop waterhole on the lower dune road
This annual has light yellow flowers in summer (yes, and thorns!), especially after good rains. It’s the most widespread and noticeable of all the Kalahari creepers, growing by the roadside in the riverbeds and up the dune slopes, as well as in necklaces around the base of trees like the camel thorn. Animals eat the plants and they’re used medicinally for rheumatism.

Devil’s claw / duiwelsklou (Harpagophytum procumbens)
Kalahari in bloom
This ground creeping plant with bluish-green leaves has deep pinkish-red tubular flowers with yellow centres. It flowers in late summer and the fruit has vicious barbs that attach themselves to animal’s hooves as a means of dispersal. The roots and tubers are used for ailments as diverse as disorders of the intestines, gall-bladder and kidneys, as well as diabetes, gout and arthritis.

Gemsbok cucumber (Acanthosicyos naudinianus)
Kalahari in bloom
This herb with a yellow summer flower has a large tap root that goes 1.5 metres into the sand. Despite its bitterness the spiny fruit’s moisture makes it a favourite with porcupines, springbok and gemsbok. Rodents and insects drink the water that gathers in old shells after rain.

Tsamma melon (Citrullus lanatus)
Kalahari in bloom
The round tsamma fruit is green, mottled with darker green much like a watermelon. Unlike a watermelon, though, it’s fairly tasteless but since it is 90-95% moisture it’s the main source of water during dry times. The seeds can be crushed to a powder and made into porridge. In dry years there are hardly any tsammas, but after unusually high rainfall in 2000 more than 15 000 per hectare were counted in the park.

Salt of the tortoise / menssuring (Oxygonum delagoense)
Picture
This fleshy annual herb produces small, delicate white or pinkish-mauve flowers in summer. The leaves and stems have a refreshingly acidic taste and lots of moisture – a kind of Kalahari lemonade.

Cat’s tail / katstert (Hermbstaedtia fleckii)
Kalahari in bloom
This summer flowering annual stands up to 600mm tall, with spikes of pinkish or mauve flowers. They are at their most conspicuous after good rains. A Bushman guide once told me, wrinkling his nose, that they have no use, neither eaten by animals nor with any medicinal value. I love them just for being pretty.

Yellow mouse whiskers / oorpynpeultjie (Cleome angustifolia)
Kalahari in bloom
Yellow flowers with a purple base are produced on slender stems from summer till autumn. They appear in large numbers after good rain. The wind was blowing at Auchterlonie picnic site when we photographed this one so I held it by the stem to steady it. When I took my fingers away they were covered in the dark stinky pasting of a brown hyena – not nearly as nice as the flower.

Thunderbolt flower / brandboontjie (Sesamum triphyllum)
Kalahari in bloom
Erect stems up to 1.5m tall have tubular purple flowers from summer to autumn. It’s the ultimate opportunist – it starts its life cycle as soon as good rains fall. Also known as wild sesame, its leaves are an aphrodisiac, its roots a remedy against snakebite.

Bitterkambro (Adenium oleifolium)
Kalahari in bloom
This succulent small shrub with grey-green hairy leaves has showy bright pink flowers in early summer, though in mid March we still found lots of them clustered on calcareous outcrops along the Auob riverbed. It’s one of the ingredients in arrow poison, and dried powder made from the tuber is applied to wounds, snake bites and scorpion stings.

Bushman poison weed / gifbol (Boophone disticha)
Kalahari in bloom
The name is a nod to the use of its poisonous bulb for arrow poison. A deep-pink flower on a fat stem grows before the leaves appear in their characteristic fan-shaped pattern (above right). When dry, the fruiting head (above left) becomes what we know as a tumble weed, rolling about in the wind to disperse its seeds. They flower in spring and early summer.

Still think the Kgalagadi is nothing but lions and red sand? Thought not.

You may also like:
Travels in the Kalahari

Copyright © Roxanne Reid - No words or photographs on this site may be used without permission from roxannereid.co.za
Did you enjoy the article? Pin this image!
Think the Kalahari is just a dry desert? Find out about some of the flowering plants of the Kalahari, especially the Kgalagadi Transfrontier National Park between South Africa and Botswana
Wild flowers of the Kalahari. Author of 'Travels in the Kalahari' shares her hints. Find the ebook on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009VGNECU/
20 Comments
Brett
27/4/2016 06:37:55 pm

Great article Roxanne, it balances the world view of Lions and more Lions! ... and thank you for posting the link on Kgalagadi Sightings :)

Reply
Roxanne
29/4/2016 08:43:46 am

Thanks for your comment, Brett. Yes, lions are great but they're not everything!

Reply
Sakkie
2/5/2016 02:11:41 am

The diversity of life, that is what is amazing about the creation. With the plants would be a diversity of insects also. Thanks for the beautiful pictures.

Reply
Roxanne
2/5/2016 04:58:17 am

True, Sakkie. It's that diversity of small detail that makes the Kgalagadi so special.

Reply
Lawrence Akanyang
27/1/2017 05:06:59 pm

The article is very useful I managed to identify some plants for my PhD projects (Kalahari). Thank you, I have save the site as one of my favourites.

Reply
Roxanne
28/1/2017 10:15:51 am

So glad to help, Lawrence. You'd love the book so keep an eye out for when it goes digital. And good luck with your PhD.

Reply
Gail Klein link
19/6/2019 07:40:13 am

what is in the first photo with the fur?

Reply
Roxanne
19/6/2019 10:04:24 am

That's a "lion's paw flower", Gail. :-)

Reply
robin Fay-McNair
17/3/2020 10:17:10 pm

Nice writing! I will return. thanks

Reply
Roxanne Reid
18/3/2020 10:23:34 am

Thanks for the compliment. Glad you enjoyed it.

Reply
Liedie Hiemstra
18/3/2020 02:20:16 pm

Hallo Roxanne, we have just returned from KGNP which was partially green, but still huge areas that were dry. I have a photo of a blooming plant, probably a perennial, but can't find a reference anywhere. Can you perhaps help?

Reply
Roxanne
21/3/2020 01:47:03 pm

I'm no expert, Liedie; my best advice is to email Noel van Rooyen, the author of the book I mention in the third paragraph of this article. It really is worth having your own copy for future trips to Kgalagadi.

Reply
Kerri Smithers
30/6/2020 08:47:41 am

Hi Roxanne. Please could you help me with the identification of the top left flower in the article with the three pictures together? I don't have a copy of the book, unfortunately. A lovey article!

Reply
Roxanne
30/6/2020 09:24:54 am

Hard to be sure, Kerri, because Aptosimum lineare (snapdragon family) and Peliostomum leucorrhizum (karooviooltjie) flowers are very similar. From the leaves and the fact that this one seems to be growing low to the ground, I'd guess the first.

Reply
jeff
10/5/2022 10:13:40 am

Hi Roxanne, I stumbled across your posts this morning. Lovely to see great flower photos of plants I have got to know. You don't seem to have been busy in the western part of North-West Province; definitely worth a visit. I have written tourist guides for Botsalano and Mafikeng Game Reserves and am rounding off Molopo GR at the moment. Most of your Kalahari plants also occur in the latter park.

Reply
Roxanne Reid
14/5/2022 02:22:26 pm

You're right, Jeff, North-West isn't an area we've spent much time since I started this blog. Maybe one day... Good to know you make the most of the reserves there.

Reply
David MacGregor
15/7/2023 12:45:45 pm

Hi there,is there a book on the flora in the kgalagadi?

Reply
Roxanne Reid
15/7/2023 01:50:59 pm

Yes, David, you'll find the details in the 3rd paragraph of the post.

Reply
Andre Hoffmann
10/6/2024 09:08:13 pm

Hi Roxanne, hope you can help me... I am looking for the name of a wildflower we used to seek for on our farm in Kuruman. Its a small kreeper with a hairy seedpod and seeds pop when you put it under your tongue. Cant find its name anywhere

Reply
Roxanne Reid
11/6/2024 04:34:12 pm

I'm no plant fundi, Andre. Can I rather suggest you ask Noel - mentioned in the blog post above - or join the Facebook group called 'Indigenous flora of southern Africa' and ask there. There are lots of helpful and knowledgeable people there.

Reply

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    I'm an independent travel writer and book editor with a passion for Africa - anything from African travel, people, safari and wildlife to adventure, heritage, road-tripping and slow travel.
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