Moraea miniata

Moraea miniata, commonly the poison bulb and sometimes the two-leaved Cape tulip, in Afrikaans the pronktulp (prance tulip) or the kraaitulp (crow tulip) and previously scientifically Homeria miniata, is a perennial geophyte of the Iridaceae family growing from a corm to heights from 15 cm to 60 cm.

The salmon, yellow or white flowers have star-shaped yellow central patches covered in fine speckles. This central star is delineated here by angular lines at the base of the six tepals. A faint dark line runs centrally along the length of each tepal. There are a few trailing narrow leaves from the base and a corm covered in a fibrous tunic below ground.

The species distribution is in the Northern Cape from the Richtersveld to the Western Cape to Bredasdorp and the Karoo.

The habitat is renosterveld and scrub in clayey soils. The habitat population is deemed of least concern early in the twenty first century.

This is a poisonous plant holding danger to livestock, one of the notorious tulpe troubling stock farmers. Use of the plant is banned in Australia on account of its invasiveness.

South Africa and Australia are suffering from quite a few of these "undiplomatic" botanical exchanges. Both countries battle unwanted aliens, invader plants proliferating on farms and in the natural vegetation. The long-term implications are often recognised too late, the danger not imagined of a species so attractive and innocuous on its home ground. Adhering to the rules that apply for preventing further accidents of this nature is in everyone's interest: Don't take biological material over national borders in contravention of the law (Manning, 2009; iNaturalist; http://redlist.sanbi.org).