Tylecodon reticulatus subsp. reticulatus old and older flowers

Recently flowered, the old Tylecodon reticulatus subsp. reticulatus corollas are urn-shaped. The bulging, brown-ridged tubes are longer than the withered brown lobes above them that curl their dry tips in, as floral features make way for fruiting ones.

The small calyces below the corollas by now spread their narrow lobes away from the bases of the tubes. In one case the calyx has already lost its grip and dropped as a loose, red-brown, star-shaped ring around its pedicel. This is where the calyces remain for long, whirring in the wind. This serves to delude prospective browsers into mistaking them for insects like ants that will be bothersome in the mouth and thus saves the plant from being eaten.

Dry floral remains persist for long in this plant. Some of last year’s blackish corollas are still present in the photo, now reduced to the five hard corolla ridges elegantly spreading their tips, as if they were much more open and welcoming to visitors than they ever were during flowering (Frandsen, 2017; Smith, et al, 2017; Leistner, (Ed.), 2000; iNaturalist).