Description:

• Shrubs or undershrubs, procumbent to prostrate with greyish to yellow stems and distinct internodes
• Leaves opposite, slightly connate at base, up to 50 mm long, almost terete to trigonous, mucronate; epidermis ± flat, bladder cells rare, often flat, smooth, often with bluish, waxy coating
• Flowers solitary or in rich dichasia, terminal or axillary, shortly pedicellate, ebracteate, up to 50 mm in diameter; opening at midday
• Sepals 4 or 5
• Petals free, yellow, golden, pink or reddish purple (often purplish outside and golden inside)
• Stamens often papillate towards base; staminodes present
• Nectary: glands sometimes united into a crenulate ring
• Ovary flat on top; placentas parietal; stigmas 8-12, small, plumose
• Fruit a 8-12-locular capsule, of Drosanthemum type; parietal placentas often ending distally in prominent, sometimes bipartite knobs acting as closing bodies; base of locules divided by false septum which, together with splitting proper septa, forms pockets containing 1 or 2 seeds; these schizocarpous units are then dispersed
• Seeds flat, rough with tubercles in rows
• x = 9 (1 report)

• Flowering: Some species flower in winter some in summer

• Distinguishing characters:
  • Creeping to rarely upright perennials
  • Leaves waxy
  • Flowers yellow to red
  • Capsule 8-12-locular, sometimes with bifid closing bodies

Nomenclature:

• Malephora N.E.Br.
  • Brown: 12 (1927)
  • Jacobsen & Rowley: 77 (1958)
  • Herre: 200 (1971)
  • Smith et al.: 268 (1998)
• Crocanthus L.Bolus
  • Bolus: t. 255 (1927)
• Hymenocyclus Dinter & Schwantes
  • Schwantes: 27 (1927)
  • Friedrich: 56 (1970)

Distribution & Notes:

• Southern Africa: Species 14, from S Namibia to Namaqualand in the Northern Cape, through the Great and Little Karoos to the Eastern Cape, some known from the S Free State