Stapelia rufa flower

The flowers of Stapelia rufa grow three to five together from near the base or the middle of a young stem, developing successively. The flower stalk is stout and velvety. The small sepals, also velvety, taper to acute tips. Flowering happens in spring.

The corolla, the main feature of a Stapelia flower, in this species has a broad open central disc and five long attenuating lobes, curving back on the flower of the photo, but not in all flowers. On the inside of the corolla there is red and brownish red among the transverse ridges and yellow-green lines, redder towards the lobe tips. Rufus (Latin) means red or redhaired, referring to the flower colour. The outside surface of the corolla is covered in velvety hairs. The corolla lobes are glabrous, i.e. hairless near the base, finely hairy towards their tips, particularly on their upper margins.

The outer corona has tiny, nearly rectangular lobes, channelled and orange on their surfaces, ciliate along their margins, i.e. there are hairs looking like eyelashes. The inner corona, still smaller above them in the centre, has erect, oblong lobes. The anthers are yellow, providing the colouring in the flower centre in the photo where they protrude from under the inner corona (Smith, et al, 2017; White and Sloane, 1937; iNaturalist).