Hermannia hyssopifolia

In this picture taken at Greyton in September the toothed upper leaf parts of Hermannia hyssopifolia can be seen. Another photo in this Album shows most of the "leaves" to be narrower with entire margins attenuating to an acute tip. These are not really leaves, but leaf-like stipules that grow next to the leaf petioles. The stipules that drop off long before leaves in many species seem here to persist and have remained where leaves have already dropped off.

Another surprise comes from the discovery that the inflated hairy flower shape of H. hyssopifolia is not a corolla, but the calyx (Vlok and Schutte-Vlok, 2010; Manning, 2009).