Description
(syn. Homeria lilacina)
It makes a branched stem which can reach 60cm tall (usually less) which is branched, each branch on a flowering plant bearing a solitary flower. These are usually pale violet-blue but they do vary rarely to as far as white, or darker blue , though even the darker colours are quite pale in this species. All of the colour variations have a small, yellow eye on each of the petals. Each flower lasts only a day, but as several are borne on each stem and several stems can be made from just one corm, so the display is always present, especially in a clump but even if just a few corms are grown. In a clump, flowers can be present over a period of months.
A readily grown, easy species widely spread in the wild across clay flats and low rocky areas in the Cape province of South Africa. The wild habitats do experience late spring rains and continued watering of this species into early summer will result in continued flowering.
The species grows from very strongly ribbed corms but please note that these are naturally quite small, that is simply how the plant is.
Introduced to our lists August 2024
Pictures cropped and reduced in size from Wikimedia Commons, with thanks to SAplants (own work) used under CC BY-SA 4.0