Pegolettia retrofracta fruiting adventures

The ripening Pegolettia retrofracta heads are about cylindrical, long and narrow. The lowest bracts are not dry yet, forming green surface ridges around the flowerhead bases. They will spread to allow the individual fruits to depart in flight and attempt a new life somewhere when the time is right. Patience and urgency meet in the right timing for fruition and flight.

The single, escaped fruit from another, older head hangs on in picture for the moment, will soon move on when the next gust of air arrives.

In the background an empty involucre, its bracts spread widely, is out of focus. Its crop is gone, fending for themselves in the big, wide world, all of a few to quite a few metres away (Vlok and Schutte-Vlok, 2015; Leistner, (Ed.), 2000; iNaturalist).