Barleria pungens flower

The flowers of Barleria pungens grow solitary or in few-flowered racemes from leaf axils on upper stems. They are subtended by spiny bracts that are narrower than the leaves and have a few marginal spines apart from the harsh terminal ones. The calyx is four-lobed, also spiny, its lobes unequal.

The corolla consists of a long, funnel-shaped tube that ends in spreading five nearly equal, elliptic lobes, coloured blue-purple or white. The corolla is about 15 mm in diameter. The flowers are often short-lived, loosened corollas seen dangling from their styles.

Flowering happens from late spring to after midsummer, the season sometimes longer but the plants responsive to rain.

An ellipsoid, flattened fruit capsule is produced (Curtis-Scott, et al, 2020; Vlok and Schutte-Vlok, 2015; Bond and Goldblatt, 1984; JSTOR; iNaturalist).