Asparagus capensis spine colours

Asparagus capensis produces spines of unequal length at the same node. There are often three of them, the central one longest but in picture only one or two visible per node.

The spines are here dark-tipped apart from a little orange-yellow at their extremes where they will make their presence felt on those venturing into personal plant space.

Colouring of the cladodes and spines is softened here by the relentless west coast sun at treeless Tietiesbaai. Random blotches in two tones on the stem in view add to the complexion, as do the dark spine-tips (Vlok and Schutte-Vlok, 2015).