Gardenia cornuta in the foreground

Gardenia cornuta, the horned gardenia is densely branched, a shrub or small tree rarely as tall as 5 m (SA Tree List No. 690.1).

Seen here during midwinter in Lowveld bushveld, typical of its normal habitat, many of the upper branchlets are rather sparsely covered in leaves. Spring rain quickly changes that. It also brings the late spring and summer flowers with their sweet, heavy scent (Coates Palgrave, 2002).