Eriospermum cooperi

The leaf in picture is thought to belong to an Eriospermum cooperi plant, a tuberous perennial that reaches about 60 cm when flowering. The solitary, stalked leaf angles up from nearly prostrate to nearly erect. Its broadly oval blade ends in a bluntly pointed tip, usually showing faint vein lines across the green upper surface. There may be red at the base. The leaf is usually seen after flowering, sometimes concurrently.

The flowers grow in a slender, erect inflorescence that has a sheathing bract at the base with a small blade. The pedicels are from 8 mm to 30 mm long. The white to pale green flowers may sometimes have red speckles or red brown outer tepals. The perianth segments are joined only at the base. There is much nectar in the flowers, emerging from the base of the filaments. Flowering happens from late winter to after midsummer.

The species distribution is in the east and north of the country, from the north of the Eastern Cape, the east of the Free State, KwaZulu-Natal and all the provinces north of the Vaal River. The photo was taken near the Sani Pass.

The habitat is rocky grassland from the coast to elevations around 2250 m. The habitat population is deemed of least concern early in the twenty first century (Van Wyk and Malan, 1997; Pooley, 1998; iNaturalist; http://redlist.sanbi.org).