Osteospermum monstrosum bracts around the flowerheads

The contrast between Osteospermum monstrosum involucral bracts of the inner and outer rows around the flowerhead is starkly displayed here.

The outer bracts are narrow, finger-like, dark and hairy, appearing to serve in grasping or holding the floral contents in place. The sheet-like, membranous inner bracts are wide, thinly textured, papery and translucent. They provide the rays immediately inside them with a shiny, protective covering like a garment. Protection may be functional against the elements like wind, retaining moisture and possibly stabilising temperature through reflection.

The upper stem-leaves partly in picture are narrow and hairy like the outer floral bracts.

This plant has yellow rays that lack brown-purple markings at the base; one of the intraspecies individual differences. The rays here curve out at their notched tips that may be slightly green in minute parts of the extremities (Vlok and Schutte-Vlok, 2015; Manning, 2007; iNaturalist).