Myrsine africana fruit

The fruits of Myrsine africana are thinly fleshy, changing colour repeatedly en route to ripeness.

This fruit colour change in a particular sequence for each species serves to assist consumers in assessing the stage of ripening, the time to ripeness (if they have such cognitive abilities) and the key issue, when best to eat. Colour change is a common attribute of the fruits of many plant species dependent upon hungry animals for seed dispersal.

Sparse surface mottling and the persistence of style remains are typical of M. africana.

The photo was taken in November in the Caledon Wildflower Garden (Coates Palgrave, 2002; Van Wyk and Van Wyk, 1997).