The Fynbos Blog

This morning’s run was at an altitude of 1700 metres. Johannesburg is a city of trees built on rolling hills on a high plateau in the middle of South Africa where the rocks were once filled with gold and the plains hosted huge herds of antelope and other game. Both are now gone, replaced by a vibrant African city that epitomises everything good, and bad, about the new South Africa.

None of that mattered particularly on the run this morning. Fellow runners came in all shapes, sizes and colours, as did the impatient drivers in their flashy SUVs breaking the traffic laws, driving straight through the red lights and making road crossings highly hazardous for a country runner like me. The spring has broken through here, birds busily building nests in all those trees, gardens blooming with early flowers.  As I ran along the suburban streets up the final hill, lungs heaving in the oxygen depleted air and on the point of giving up, The Boss came on the headphones and told me we were “Born to Run”.  Up came the head, out went the chest and I sucked in the thin air and pushed up the hill triumphantly kicking with my heels.  One step closer to fitness.

Back on the farm rain and mild weather have brought in the spring with the first flowering bulbs, the crocus like Babinia fragrens. A veritable trove of light and colour is everywhere, the crisp lime green of the leucodendrons, the brilliant scarlet of Microloma tenufolio climbing through the branches of Mulratia heisteria, the delicate lilac of Morea tripetala, the endless tiny bells of many different Ericas in assorted pastels and much more that has emerged in the last month.

It has been a week of travel, in Geneva and Johannesburg. I am already looking forward to Monday morning, and a damp cool run with the wolfhounds to see what’s flowering next.

Babina fragrens

Leucodendron tincta

Gleaming in the early morning light

Exquisite Ericas all over the farm

Pale pink Ericas on the drive

Coral colours Microloma tenufolia climbs through the branches of Muraltia heisteria

Lobostemon fruticosus which will now flower for several months

Sprawling, hairy Oftia africana with its exquisite white flowers

Morea tripetala, like a tiny tiny Iris, grows along the drive, and in other cool damp places

I read George Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia when I was still a teenager.  The book is about his time with the communists in Barcelona fighting against Franco.  He describes a time when the communists were the most right wing group in the city as the anarchist movement took hold and there are memorable descriptions of what anarchy might actually look like in terms of politics and non-adminstration.  He moves up to fight Franco’s army in the foothills of the Pyrenees mountains where he is shot through the throat.  As they evacuate him on a stretcher, dripping with blood and certain he is going die, the leaves of a silver poplar tree brush against his face.  “How lucky”, he thinks, “I am to be alive in a world where silver poplars grow.”  There were silver poplars along the lane I rode down most days as an Irish teenager and those words often came to mind.  One morning last week I was up early and driving to the stables to ride here in South Africa.  The valley was dark but the sun was just climbing over the mountain behind me and as it climbed it caught in its fiery dawn light a flock of flamingos flying in stately formation overhead, brilliantly pink, astonishing and uncommon, even here.  How lucky I am, I thought, to live in a world where I can see a flight of flamigos in the dawn.

And this morning, running with the dogs, I saw this.  Despite the dry winter and then the  torrents of rain last Friday, this brilliant coral-red Gladiolus watsonius has chosen to emerge in the winter cold.  The wind was howling today and I could not get a great shot, but it is too good not to share.  Last year we saw it in June, the same plant, and got a wonderful shot of it which I’ve included here.  The slightly shabbier ones are from today.

After a wild and windy day the sunset last night was magnificent.  Occasionally, just for a moment, the entire mountain behind us is light by the flooding last light of the sunset.  I usually miss the moment.  Last night it happened just as I pulled into the car park and I sprinted down to the dam wall just in time to capture it.

Dawn Run.  Until today those words evoked a racehorse, an Irish mare so famous that she is commemorated in bronze at Cheltenham Racecourse.  In a totally different context the words came to me this morning as I trotted down the drive and saw the pink tinge to the cloud across the valley against the Paarl Mountain.

The start of the Dawn Run

The number one rule of a blog is frequent updates to keep your audience interested.  If I still have an audience I apologise to you.  The point of this blog is to share the morning run and the flowers on the mountain.  The long end of summer and autumn drought means far fewer flowers than in previous years.  A newcomer would still be astonished by the nature and variety our winter flowering season, old hands like us are a little disapointed by the lack of profusion.  The other restraint might be that I’m doing a lot of writing:  first, a book.  I think it might be a good one too, though I am a little daunted at the challenge of finding a publisher.  Secondly a new business and the need to develop a more business related “online presence”.  All that means a lot of writing and perhaps the blog has suffered because of that.

Even with fewer flowers this mountain rewards every run.  The winter has been odd, a bit too dry, a bit too mild.  Out running that’s not bad at all.  Seamus in particular relishes winter, even a mild one, and gets a new lease of life when summer’s heat gives way to the autumn cool.  He’s an old boy now but he lights up when the running shoes come out.  The girls are always enthusiastic; they put up an antelope again the other day.  Luckily their passion for hunting far outweighs any skills they may have.  Other signs of life include porcupine quills on the road, and little holes where he digs up the wild bulbs during the night.  We can spare them and I love that while we sit in the study in front of a winter fire, high up on the mountain the porcupine snuffles along the road where we will run in the morning.

Flowers there are and we’ve taken the time to capture them.  Witness the first Leucospermum lineare of the year.  This lovely pincushion, known as “The Vulnerable” and a member of the protea family, is endangered so it’s wonderful that it grows here.  Even better that this one comes from a new plant, so it’s thriving on the farm.  There will be more photos of this as the flowers appear over the coming months.

Leucospermum lineare “The Vulnerable”

More of the Eriocephalus africanus, the wild rosemary, is appearing at last.  Not as prolific as in other years, but some are covered with these gorgeous tiny white flowers.

Eriocephalus africanus, Wild Rosemary

Eriocephalus africanus

Our winter jewels especially include the many varieties of Oxalis whose brilliant flowers stud the banks, the lands and the olive groves.

Oxalis per-caprae – note the tiny insects enjoying the pollen

Oxalis purpurea

Oxalis purpurea

Oxalis purpurea

Oxalis purpurea

Oxalis veriscolor peeping through a buchu plant (Agthomsa betulina)

Oxalis versicolor

The waterfall is low, but still falling and beautiful on a weekend morning.  Near it grows the magnificent Protea Nitida.  Not so many flowers this year and not so easy to get close enough to take good pictures as they seem to like steep slopes.

Protea nitida

Protea Nitida

Another winter delight is Leucospermum salignum.  The flowers are a wonderful yellow lime green and the plants glow on the mountain in the dull light of a winter dawn.  The male and female flowers are completely different but the shrubs like to grow side by side.

Leucospermum salignum Lime yellow green male flowers

Leucospermum salignum, female flowers

Growing side by side

Leucospermum salignum glows on the mountain in the dim winter dawn

April was the driest since 1952.  And May won’t be far behind it, certainly the first half.  I have always seen the month of May here on the mountain as a kind of mini-spring, an awakening of the land after the long dry crackling heat of the summer.  Not this year.  We have permanent streams on the farm, pouring out of the mountain above us in a flow that most often roars but that trickles now.  The dams below us are emptying, a worrying sign; it will take the entire winter’s rains to replenish some of the biggest.  There are flowers, there are always flowers here; the proteas I have already posted continue to flourish, impervious to the water requirements of other, lesser plants.  And a few plants flower all year round, like the gorsey Mulraltia heisteria.  At this time of year there should be thousands of Oxalis, of many different varieties littering every bank, every part of the lands, every flourishing spot.  There are hardly any.

At last the drought has broken.  For the first time we have had a dull cloudy week with actual rain.  Not masses of rain, but light, steady, falling through the night, showering through the days.  There is heavy rain forecast next week and every farmer in the province must be praying that this massed gathering of life-bearing cloud does not disappear off into the southern oceans but this time hits us fair and square.  Those in Cape Nature whose task it is to clean up after the massive fires on Table Mountain will feel more ambiguously.  They need the rain to help the fynbos recover, of course.  But their biggest concern is the massive and almost inevitable landslides that will be the result of the dry, brittle, burnt soil with nothing to hold it to the mountain.  Meanwhile our dogs love the damp misty weather.  Maebh, caught in the early morning mist here looks like an impressionist painting.

Maebh in the early morning mist

Just before leaving for New York a couple of weeks ago I caught a glimpse of something pretty and pink high on the bank above the drive.  It had almost finished flowering.  I think it was a Nerine but it was too high and too far for me to confirm it.

This on the other hand is highly distinctive.  Chironia baccifera,known as the Christmas berry it gives us the lovely mass of pink flowers that I posted in December and then these red berries in the autumn.

Chrionia backfire

Running up the mountain in the mist I saw at last that the wild rosemary is coming into flower.  The tiny white flowers are exquisite and will appear soon in this blog.  It is worth waiting for the right light and the right shot.  They are among the first shrubs to flower and then delight the eye for months during the winter, covering the lands in white confetti.  I’m sure there will be some to blog about soon.  The other little harbinger of hope that I saw was a few green leaves of Babinia that had broken through the hard, sun-battered earth of the road as I ran towards home.  By now these are usually everywhere, little bulbs preparing to throw out their beautiful blue crocus-like flowers in late July and early August.  Still, even one is a good sign.

In the meantime this is a place of spectacular beauty.  The moon sets in the early morning behind Paarl Mountain.  The sun sets behind the Paaderburg and the last splash of colour is reflected in the dwindling dams below us.  This is a beautiful place, autumn replaces the winds of summer with a still calm that brings thoughts of cathedrals and holy places, here on the mountain.

Moon setting in the dawn light

Sunset over the Paaderberg

A combination of trips away and what my father used to call the dreaded lurgy have kept me off the mountain.  Indeed many things have conspired against blog updates in the past few weeks but none so much as the weather.  Almost the end of April and still not a drop of rain beyond a couple of localised showers.  This may not be the first time it’s happened but its the first time since we’ve been on the farm.  We have permanent water here, but it’s slowing down to a trickle yet this spongey, water-filled mountain range must feed the whole of Cape Town in the dry weather.  Dams are half full; which is fine, if it rains soon.  There is nothing beyond a drop or two in the 10 day forecast.

So after two exceptional years this could be a poor one for flowers on the mountain.  By now we usually see the first signs of winter bulbs to come, the pushing up of determined leaves breaking through the hard summer burned soil as the first rains arrive.  This year, nothing.  The runs and flowers inspire this blog; we may be in for a slow year.

Some shrubs have to flower now, it is their season.  Despite the dry, there are signs of life. Senecio pubigerus is out this year with more determination than flourish.

Senecio pubigerus

Senecio pubigerus

The quality of today’s photos is not fantastic, I’ve been playing with the iphone’s camera and clearly got these exposures wrong.

The Phylica (I never know which one this is) though less prolific than usual is starting to show, .

Phylica

The Selago corymbosa is doing better.  It likes damp areas and where there is seeping water it is flowering away quite happily.

This is new, I don’t think I’ve posted it before.  I suspect it’s Monopsis though I’m not convinced it’s Monopsis lutea, the more common variety.

Monopsis (lutea?)

The one dazzling display is the Protea Repens which seems not to mind the harshness of the elements.  Every plant is covered in bees.  A delight and a sign that life goes on, no matter how tough the conditions.

Protea repens

I took the dogs for a walk at sunset tonight.  Despite the lateness of the season the air still holds the last vestiges of summer, mild with that hint of warmth and faintly dusty, it envelops the skin like silk.  The atmostphere on a still evening is hard to describe, the great mountain protecting our back and the glorious evening light to the west.  As we walked the sun set over the Paardeberg and I took photos of the changing sky.