Operation Wildflower
  • Home
  • Albums
  • Links
    • Botanical Gardens
    • OWF Sites
    • Public Parks, Gardens and Reserves
    • Reference Sites
    • Private Parks, Gardens and Reserves
  • Information
    • About Us
    • Articles
    • Contact Us
    • Disclaimer
    • Glossary
    • Plant Records
      • Aloes
      • Bulbs
      • Climbers
      • Cycads
      • Euphorbias
      • Ferns
      • Grasses
      • Herbs
      • Orchids
      • Parasites
      • Shrubs
      • Succulents
      • Trees
    • Sources of Information
    • Subject Index
Home Home » HABITAT » Habitat diversity » Salsola aphylla in habitat
Back to Category Overview
Total images in all categories: 12,081
Total number of hits on all images: 7,379,063

Salsola aphylla in habitat

Salsola aphylla in habitat
Start View full size
[Please activate JavaScript in order to see the slideshow]
Previous Previous
Image 117 of 143  
Next Next
Image 119 of 143  
  • Restio ruminations
  • Rhodocoma capensis
  • Rhodocoma capensis branch tips
  • Rhodocoma capensis flowers
  • Rhodocoma gigantea
  • Rhodocoma gigantea male spikelets
  • Rhodocoma gigantea sheath on a culm
  • Rhodocoma gigantea sterile branchlets
  • Salsola aphylla in habitat
  • San rock art in the Cederberg
  • Sandstone sheet matrix
  • Satyrium hallackii subsp. ocellatum making its presence felt
  • Shelter or early home
  • Snail on the move
  • Southern yellowbilled hornbill in Ziziphus camouflage
  • Spekboom on a southern slope
  • Spring celebration in the Little Karoo

Image information

Description

This landscape may look grey and bereft of moisture in summer. Winter usually dishes out a comfortable share of life-supporting rain over these southern Cape hills between Stormsvlei and McGregor. The land resembles the Little Karoo that lies well to the north east.

The shrubs in the foreground with the whitish tips are Salsola aphylla, enjoying a prosperous life here. As do the sweet-thorn trees, Vachellia karroo, sharing the space with a multitude of low growing species. Many shrublets, bulbs and succulents venture higher up these slopes, into more hardship than these two comfort seekers have to contend with down in the valley. All the land is used: plants produce surplus seeds to avail themselves of every possibility. The chance to live is taken by all species wherever it presents itself. This is the inevitability for seeds falling on the rock! The struggle is to the limit. Everywhere. Every time.

S. aphylla grows in the deeper soil close to or inside the seasonal watercourses of the arid interior. The tiny succulent leaves serve to conserve moisture for dry times, should the roots find none in their search deep underground.

Note the spelling difference of Karoo above. The current, conventional form says this harsh, beloved land is the Karoo. The alternative, Karroo, also exists (or existed). Sweet thorn trees were formally named when the Karroo form was in vogue. This name has therefore to be retained, just as the spelling error in the name of a parent is often retained when registering the name of the child. Official name changes are difficult as they should be.

Hits
334
Photographer
Ivan Latti
Author
Ivan Latti
 
Back to Category Overview
Powered by JoomGallery