Romulea sabulosa

Romulea sabulosa, commonly known in Afrikaans as satynblom (satin flower), is a flowering geophyte of the Iridaceae family. It has a globose corm from which several cylindrical, grooved leaves grow at ground level.

The bell-shaped flower has broad tepals with red-brown tips that curve out over a multicoloured central cup. There is a black blotch on each tepal below its middle, surrounded by greenish yellow and two bright yellow lines at the base. The stamens are erect in the centre. 

Triggered by the winter rain received in the region where it grows, the annual above-ground parts sprout from the perennial corm and flower in late winter and spring.

The species distribution is small, in the southwest of the Northern Cape near Nieuwoudtville and slightly into the Western Cape.

The habitat is renosterveld where the soil is clayey. The plant is considered vulnerable in habitat early in the twenty first century, due to habitat loss, pollution and alien vegetation invasion (www.pacificbulbsociety.org; http://redlist.sanbi.org).