Psoralea aphylla

    Psoralea aphylla

    Psoralea aphylla has leaves so small and scale-like that it has earned the name of leafless fountainbush, reflected in the specific epithet aphylla.

    The plant is a slender shrub that often droops, listed among South African trees (No. 226.8).  Maybe the specimen in the photo isn’t drooping as it grows in veld in Jonkershoek that had been devastated by a big fire just a few years before. These young stems may well droop from size later (Coates Palgrave, 2002; Bean and Johns, 2005).