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IDM Zimbabwe - Wentzel's Sugarbush - Protea wentzeliana
Moorland Sugarbushes occur in high mountainous areas. The leaves are stiff, bluish, densely pilose when young, aging to hairless. The involucral bracts are covered by short, dense, silky hairs, and are shorter than the flowers. The tepals have very slinder middle sections, so that they collapse to the base of flowers on opening.
Protea wentzeliana - Wentzel's Sugarbush = Pr neocrinita A multi-stemmed shrub to 1.5m tall. Leaves 60-120 mm long, 15-55 mm long, woolly when young. Involucral bracts pale brown with pink tips, with silky hairs that drop off after flowering. Tepals hairless at base, with tufts of white hairs at tip.
Beard recognizes this as a species Pr neocrinita. However, in the herbarium specimens are identical to those of Pr went from Angola.
In Zimbabwe, Pr went only occurs on Chimanimani Mountains.
Pr wentzeliana is obviously a problem species. Beard recognizes Pr wentzeliana, rubrobracteata and neocrinita, which Chisumpa & Brummit regard as only one species. According to Beard rubrobracteata has cup-shaped flowerheads (wentzeliana has the bracts opening to a plate-like position), and the tepals of neocrinita are nearly hairless (hairy in wentzeliana). The current feeling is that two species should be recognized: Pr wentzeliana and Pr rubrobracteata, although the latter may be recognized as a subspecies. Under this concept, typical Pr wentzeliana is a low shrub with widely splayed involucral bracts, confined to southern Tanzania and Malawi.
A solid black dot indicates where the species is found.
