Brachystelma chloranthum

Brachystelma chloranthum, previously Tenaris chlorantha, is a slender, dwarf perennial growing an annual stem from a large cup-shaped tuber. The leaves grow opposite, long and thin on the slender stem. The leaves are hairless, linear, channelled and dull green in colour.

The delicate flowers grow long-stalked in small clusters from leaf axils. The flowers are spidery, five-pointed star-shapes, the petal lobes thread-like with down-curved margins. There are microscopic papillae on the inner surface of the corolla. Flower colour is pale purplish brown, the coronas tiny and whitish in the centre. The outer corona lobes have notched tips, the even tinier inner corona lobes taper to their tips.

The species is known in Gauteng near Johannesburg, on the Magaliesberg and further to the west, also beyond the border in Zimbabwe. It grows on grassy slopes and is not considered to be threatened in its habitat early in the twenty first century (JSTOR; iNaturalist; www.zimbabweflora.co.zw; http://redlist.sanbi.org).