Leucadendron nobile coloured fruit cones

When flowering starts, the female florets of Leucadendron nobile exude a musty smell. They protrude from the overlapping bracts around the flowerheads. Later the heads on the female bushes become these hard, ovoid, fruit cones in the picture, red and pale yellow like smooth pineapples. The photo was taken in the Baviaanskloof.

The cone surfaces are covered by numerous overlapping bracts, hairless with pale margins, arranged in spiralling rows. The bracts firmly shield the cone contents, keeping the narrowly winged fruits event-free for a long time. Ripe within a few months, the fruits bide their time inside the cones for years, sometimes until the plant dies. Cone measurements are about 4 cm to 9 cm long (or tall) and 2,5 cm to 4 cm wide.

The unpleasant smelling male flowerheads, grown on separate bushes, are long, green spikes on bract-sheathed stalks. Male flowerheads become 3 cm to 7 cm long and 1 cm in diameter.

Flowering happens from before midspring to after midautumn (Coates Palgrave, 2002; Moriarty, 1997; Bond and Goldblatt, 1984; iNaturalist).