Huernia transvaalensis mature plant

Huernia transvaalensis grows a few flowers in season during summer and autumn. The peduncles emanate from near the stem bases. A plant with three or four flowers may have about twenty stems. 

Plants spread by rooting from stem bases wherever these touch the ground, growing more stems as the terrain will allow. They form dense clumps, creeping along the ground and lasting many years if all goes well, as is the case with the specimen in the photo taken near Hekpoort. Clumps may spread to more than 25 cm in diameter, comprising more than a hundred stems.

Apart from porcupines that may eat them, these plants are not often browsed; or rather grazed?

The southern slopes of the Magaliesberg are home to well populated, flourishing colonies of this, the Transvaal huernia. The distribution in nature is wider though, all along the length of the Magaliesberg range from west of Rustenburg to east of Pretoria and also on the northern side, at places like Brits and Northam. Some are also found far to the east, on the border between Swaziland and KwaZulu-Natal (White and Sloane, 1937).