The conical fruit capsules of this Psilocaulon junceum plant had already dried and started opening their four valves, topped with incurving valve-wings, when the photo was taken in April.
Masses of small pink or purple flowers will cover P. junceum bushes in late spring, more profusely in good rain years. Flowers grow solitary at the many branched stem tips. The flowers are about 1,5 cm in diameter, usually white in their centres from the cone of stamens and surrounding filamentous staminodes, plus some yellow from the viable anthers. Four fleshy pointed sepals hold the corolla, fused below into a short tube; two of the sepals growing opposite each other being longer than the other pair.
P. junceum pollinators include certain small dark butterflies, bees, ants and thrips (Thysanoptera).
Mesembryanthemum coriarium plants that flower pink may be confused with this species; they also have a white-flowered form (absent from P. junceum) that does not cause the problem (Vlok and Schutte-Vlok, 2010; Smith, et al, 1998; iSpot).