Lobostemon glaucophyllus flowers

The azure blue, sometimes pink flowers of Lobostemon glaucophyllus grow in cymes near stem-tips. The five sepals are free and lance-shaped, their tips acutely pointed.

The bell-shaped corolla has a short tube where the petal bases are fused, spreading in a funnel-shape to their rounded tips. The petals are hairless on the outside, unlike those of L. fruticosus. The flower is about 1,5 cm long, spreading to a corolla diameter of 1 cm.

In picture the long white filaments curve near their small, dull-coloured anthers. At the base they are purple on the corolla floor for about 1 mm. The long, white style is hairy.

The young buds in the inflorescence are also reddish purple, while the withered, brown flowers in the background still retain their blue central vein lines. Flowering happens from midwinter to spring. The photo was taken in August.

Lobostemon flowers have hairy staminal scales with lateral lobes low down at or below the base of the stamens. These scales are in the tube of the flower, sometimes lower than the point where the stamen parts from the petal. These scales are well developed in some species or mere negligible ridges or swellings. In the case of L. glaucophyllus the staminal scales are rounded with hairy lateral lobes.

The generic name, Lobostemon is derived from this feature of the plants; the Latin word, lobos, meaning lobe and the Greek word stemon, meaning stamen (Vlok and Schutte-Vlok, 2010; Manning, 2007; Eliovson, 1990; iNaturalist; http://pza.sanbi.org).