Gladiolus flanaganii

Gladiolus flanaganii, commonly the suicide gladiolus, is a cormous perennial reaching heights from 35 cm to 60 cm when flowering.

The species distribution in South Africa is in the KwaZulu-Natal Drakensberg, only near the Lesotho border and in Lesotho. The photo was taken near the Sani Pass.

The habitat is montane grassland, the plants mainly restricted to cliffs and rock crevices at elevations around 3000 m. The habitat population is deemed of least concern early in the twenty first century.

The plant is fairly common in cultivation today and is not so hard to come by, even internationally, for those specialising in rare plants (Goldblatt and Manning, 1998; Pooley, 1998; iNaturalist; https://www.rareplants.co.uk; http://redlist.sanbi.org).