Serruria fucifolia young flowerhead

This Serruria fucifolia flowerhead still has a mix of buds and recently opened florets.

The closed buds are pale and thick, contorted like long-necked birds trying to perceive the world from every angle. The bud tips bulge where the anthers still surround the unripe pollen presenters at the style-tips, destined to become the stigmas later in proceedings. The whitish to silvery hairs on the closed perianths are longer on the tips, the “bird heads”, than on the curvaceous necks.

The up-curved, naked styles are dark once freed from their four perianth segments to qualify as open florets. The inside segment surfaces of the perianth languish in a heap below, being used and discarded. They are initially pink at the base and greenish higher up (Manning, 2009; Goldblatt and Manning, 1996; Bond and Goldblatt, 1984; iNaturalist; http://pza.sanbi.org).