Spring flowers in the open spaces

Colonies of colour representing particular flowering species exert dominance in patches of the spring tapestry for limited periods. Yellow snow was strongly represented here in September 2020 at the time of the photo, but not to the exclusion of several others flowering strongly. Millions of bees have food and work when the veld looks like this.

Scattered shrubs, the housing scheme for a multitude of local birds, small mammals, insects and more, are also diverse. Guarris like Euclea tomentosa and E. linearis grow here, as well as Searsia dissecta, Euryops multifidus, hard-leafs including Phylica oleifolia and others like Wiborgia, Wiborgiella and Zygophyllum.

Such veld may appear thriving and resilient to people, although temperatures, moisture availability and other important features of the prevailing conditions are clearly beyond the human comfort zone. The plants and animals living here must be otherwise adapted or toughened for coping in their world, therefore comfortable.

In reality, veld wellbeing is often delicately poised, vulnerable against imbalances and responding poorly to incipient veld management errors. Decreases in resource availability and exceeding the conducive interval ranges of local species living conditions or comfort zones quickly result in degradation of vegetation, constituent species population numbers and the ecology.

Such statements appear at first glance easy to refute, for the veld has coped so well before farming, towns, infrastructure, mining, exotic plant invasion, interference with water availability and climate change.

These items are all key to the answer and the list is longer. It can be summarised as one item: human intervention. Without that nature would be back to normal and doing just fine, developing in a new trajectory, always with changes in the species mix, for life is not static.