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Babiana cedarbergensis
Babiana cedarbergensis is a small perennial geophyte from the Iris family, growing 4-6 cm tall from an underground corm, with velvety sword-shaped leaves and pale blue to violet musky-scented flowers. It is native to rocky sandstone flats in the Cederberg of South Africa and is best grown as a bulb in a sunny, well-drained spot.
Babiana cedarbergensis is a perennial geophytic flowering plant of 4–6 cm (1.6–2.4 in) high that has been assigned to the family Iridaceae. It has rigid, pleated, velvety hairy, sword-shaped leaves of 4-6 cm long and 2-5 pale blue to violet mirror-symmetrical flowers consisting of 6 tepals that are merged into a tube at their base and smell slightly musky. The lower tepals have white marking with dark blue outliners. It is pollinated by long-tongued flies and probably also long-tongued bees. The species grows in fynbos in the Cederberg at an altitude of around 1 km. It is called Cederberg Bobbejaantjie in Afrikaans.
The Cederberg bobbejaantjie only naturally occurs in the eastern Cederberg region on rocky sandstone flats. It is known from 12 locations, but it does not appear to be declining since it grows in a habitat unsuited for agriculture and many of the locations lie in the Cederberg Wilderness Area. The flowers are visited by the long-tongued fly Prosoeca peringueyi. The continued survival of this species is considered to be of Least Concern.
Baboon Root · Babiana angustifolia · Brandvlei Bobbejaantjie · Violet Scent Bobbejaantjie · Pakhuis Bobbejaantjie · Mini Rat Tail Bobbejaantjie · Nama Bobbejaantjie · Pink Bobejaantjie · Needleleaf Bobbejaantjie · Limestone Bobbejaantjie · Cinnamon Bobbejaantjie · Sandveld Bobbejaantjie
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Babiana cedarbergensis by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
