Protea lorifolia

Protea lorifolia, the strap-leaved protea, sometimes becomes only a compact shrub of 1,5 m or so. When conditions allow it is a small tree of around 3 m, while rarely reaching 5 m in height (SA Tree List No. 91). The grey to glaucous bark, initially smooth, develops rough round patches and gradually becomes rough all over. The trunk is from 10 cm to 40 cm in diameter.

The leaves of this Protea are long, narrowly to broadly oblanceolate with rounded or shallowly notched tips. The leaves taper into their thick petioles. Leaf colour is grey-green to blue-green, leaf texture leathery. Hairiness of the leaf surfaces occurs only when the leaves are young. The thickened leaf midrib and margins are cream or red, cartilaginous. The leaves are from 12 cm to 25 cm long and from 2 cm to 5 cm wide. The tapering petioles (leaf stalks) are from 1 cm to 1,5 cm long. 

The inflorescence is broadly oblong to inversely conical. The involucral bract tips have distinct silvery or purple-brown beards. The heads are up to 13 cm long and up to 5 cm in diameter. The perianths are up to 9 cm long, tipped with awns of white and purple-black hairs. Flowering happens mainly during autumn and winter.

The species distribution is in the Western Cape from the Ceres through the Little Karoo, Baviaanskloof and the Kouga to Somerset East and Makhanda (Grahamstown) in the Eastern Cape.

The habitat is dry fynbos and renosterveld mountain slopes in shale and sandstone. The habitat population is deemed of least concern early in the twenty first century (Vlok and Schutte-Vlok, 2015; Coates Palgrave, 2002; Rebelo, 1995; Rourke, 1980; iNaturalist; http://redlist.sanbi.org).