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PROTEACEAE 



Protea tenuifotia. The stems of this and some allied species spread in the 

 ground, the flower-heads only and the surrounding leaves appearing above the 

 surface. A nearly allied species, P. lorea, has needle-shaped leaves, 8 to 10 

 inches long, the young shoots looking like fir-twigs. On hills near Stellenbosch, 

 Caledon and other coastal districts. 



Protea speciosa. (Plates 29 and 35.) This shrub produces short erect 

 shoots, 1 to 2 feet high, with beautiful elliptical or ovate leaves provided with 

 a strong red margin. The heads are particularly showy on account of the 

 brown fur of the bracts. The leaves are generally found injured by cater- 

 pillars, while hardly any of the other species are liable to such attack. The 

 scarcity of butterflies in the Cape region may be partly due to the want of 



Fig. 78 c/. Protea neriifolia R. Br. July. Hex River Mountains. 4200 feet. 



Photo, by Izaak Meiring 



food which their larvae could rind here, for almost all the indigenous plants 

 and especially the shrubby species are well protected against the attacks of 

 insects, either by an abundance of tannin like most Proteaceae, or by aromatic 

 oils like the Rutaceae, or by sharp and acrid ingredients like many mono- 

 cotyledons. 



An allied species with larger and even more beautiful heads, viz. 

 P. grandicepSy was formerly not unfrequent on the mountains of the Cape 

 Peninsula, but is now extinct there. When Pappe came to the Cape in 1830 

 extensive thickets of it still flourished on the slopes of the Devil's Peak, but 

 these entirely disappeared during his time, owing to a series of bush fires. 



