Namaqualand, South Africa

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Designated one of the world's 25 biodiversity hotspots by Conservation International, the Succulent Karoo in western South Africa encompasses Namaqualand, a region renowned for displays of massed wildflowers in spring.

Towards the end of winter, Namaqualand, stretching inland from South Africa's West Coast, becomes ablaze with flowers. For a few short weeks every year annuals bloom from Cape Town to Kamieskroon and beyond, forming an extraordinary array of colours that attracts visitors from around the world. The flowering peaks in August and September and in a good year up to 90 per cent of the annuals will be blooming.

The winter rains in 2001 had been good and when I left Cape Town and headed north, I was in for a treat. It turned out to be an exceptional flower season, with a rich carpet of colour that stretched all the way up the coast. Like the thousands of other tourists, I was captivated by the colourful veneer at places such as Postberg, Nieuwoudtville, Kamieskroon, Skilpad and Goegab Nature Reserve. Yet I was reminded again and again how easy it is to be blinded by the colour. One of the myths that has been perpetuated by tourism-related brochures and books is that the 'best' areas are those that have the biggest shows of flowers. But is this really the case? Plant ecologist Professor Richard Cowling believes not. In his groundbreaking book Namaqualand: A Succulent Desert, he points out that the people who flock to the massed displays are missing the point.

The Succulent Karoo is the most species-rich desert in the world. The real treasures are the mesembs (vygies) which number more than 1 700 species and make up 10 per cent of the world's succulents. The spring annuals, which bring the colours and the crowds, add up to a mere 390 species - only eight per cent of the area's total number.

Cowling is one of the scientists who helped secure the Succulent Karoo and neighbouring fynbos-rich Cape Floral Kingdom places on Conservation International's list of 25 biodiversity hotspots in the world. Since then these areas have been attracting enormous interest, research and international funding. It is perhaps significant that Frans Lanting (the only photographer ever to have filled an entire issue of National Geographic and a strong campaigner for biodiversity) was, during the spring of 2001, also focusing his cameras on the extraordinary bio-diversity of the Cape Floral Kingdom and Succulent Karoo.

The Cape Floral Kingdom needs little introduction. It is the biome with the highest concentration of plant species in the world, boasting up to 5 000 endemic species in an area of 74 000 hectares. The Succulent Karoo, which makes up much of the West Coast, is less well known. Whereas the former's fynbos vegetation occurs on Table Mountain Sandstone soils and thrives in hot, dry summer and cool, wet winter conditions, the plants of the Succulent Karoo grow on a variety of richer soils and in more arid conditions, but receive a reliable supply of about 150 millimetres of rainfall in winter.
It is understandable that people can so easily miss the point and become seduced by the showy fields of flowers. Research has shown that in disturbed areas (notably old-fields, which have been ploughed and then abandoned) seed counts can be up to 40 000 per square metre whereas undisturbed areas have lower counts that range between 100 and 10 000 seeds. Although this means that old-fields have much more spectacular carpets of flowers, the weave of species drops off drastically - as does the number of insects which coexist with them.

Natural veld supports a rich diversity of exquisite little bulbous plants, including irid, babiana and gladiolus species, and many of these have special-ist pollinators. If one looks carefully, the delicacy and diversity of these flowers are mind-boggling. Some flowers have painted streaks on their petals that act as landing strips for insects; others produce special oils for oil-collecting bees. Every wave of colour gives a specific signal to pollinators. One of the most extraordinary of these is the long-tongued fly Prosoeca peringueyi, the exclusive pollinator of 17 spring-flowering species. Its tongue is 20-50 millimetres long and perfectly designed to penetrate the long floral tubes of those 17 species, which include various irids and three pelargoniums. If the long-tongued fly goes extinct, the 17 plant species will no longer be pollinated and in all likelihood will go extinct too.

Daisy-like Arctotis species such as the gousblom have other tactics for a different pollinator; dark beetle-like markings on their petals are designed to attract gregarious monkey beetles to join the supposed party on the flower. In addition to flies, bees and beetles, other specialist pollinators include small rodents that service some ground-hugging plants, and moths that are attracted to plants whose scent is only given off in the late afternoon and early evening.

Learning how to recognise different veld types in Namaqualand and understanding how species have adapted to survive in these environ-ments is a detailed and complex business - but extremely rewarding. The most widespread of the veld types is vygieveld, characterised by its small bushes and shrubs that bear fleshy, succulent leaves. It, in turn, is broken down into various 'sub-types', including heuweltjie vygieveld and quartz-field vygieveld. The former takes its name from the small hills or 'heuweltjies' which are dotted throughout the region at surprisingly regular intervals. The hills are the work of harvester termites and their nutrient-rich disturbed soils favour short-lived vygies and pioneer annuals. Even more fascinating is the quartz-field vygieveld of the Kners-vlakte, whose plains from afar look like sterile fields of white quartz. Up close, however, it is possible to make out an amazing number of tiny succulents among the stones - as many as 250 plants in a square metre! The white stones reflect heat, cooling the leaf temperature by as much as 10 per cent. Fifty-one plant species have adapted to these conditions, and as many as 39 of them are endemic.

Another of Namaqualand's major veld types is broken veld, which occurs in high-lying areas and is characterised by tumbles of granite domes, taller succulents and desert-adapted trees such as the kokerboom Aloe dichotoma. Two more, Namaqualand renosterveld and Kamiesberg fynbos, are found even higher up, where heavier rainfall creates plants that are more akin to fynbos species than to the vegetation of the Succulent Karoo. Along the coast, strandveld is also interspersed with a mix of fynbos elements such as proteas and restios.

Since the Succulent Karoo was proclaimed a global biodiversity hotspot its preservation has become an international pri-ority, and many conservation initiatives have been established through the generous funding of insti-tutions such as the Global En-vironmental Fund and Conservation International, as well as private com-panies. One such initiative is the Skilpad Wildflower Reserve near Kamieskroon which, with funds from the Leslie Hill Succulent Karoo Trust and De Beers, has grown from being a small patch of colourful old-fields into the 60 000-hectare Namaqua National Park. It has now become a focal point for conservation initiatives, and these will ultimately trickle down into other private areas as well. Other projects on the cards are the Groenspoeg National Park and the Richtersveld Transfrontier Park, which will extend from South Africa into Namibia.

It is estimated that only about 27 per cent (or 30 000 square kilometres) of the Succulent Karoo is in a relatively pristine state. Furthermore, the two per cent that is conserved in proclaimed reserves protects only 10 per cent of the region's 600 Red Data Book Rare and Endangered species. Of the 25 international hotspots, the Succulent Karoo has the least amount of land under formal conservation. But things are happening. The Succulent Karoo Ecosystem Plan (SKEP) has been set up and funded by Conservation International and its biodiversity component is being coordinated by the Botanical Society. The task of this component is to assess the biome's state of biodiversity and identify areas that are most in need of conservation. Project manager Kristal Maze maintains that overgrazing by livestock on private and communal lands is the most wide-spread threat facing the Succulent Karoo, although invasive species and mining are also having a significant effect on its biodiversity.

One only has to look further south to see what can happen if action is not taken. In the Western Cape, wheatfields and urban sprawl have swallowed most of the area's lowland biodiversity and what remains is under increasing threat from agriculture and the spread of invasive alien plants. The Botanical Society is also lobbying government and conservation initiatives to find incentives for farmers to leave their land fallow or at least to farm it in such a way that threatened species may be protected.

Recently a step in the right direction was taken when the Cape West Coast Biosphere Reserve was promulgated to create a conservation area of public, private and state-owned land from Milnerton to the Berg River Estuary. One of the landowners involved is Mark Duckitt of Rondeberg Private Nature Reserve, whose family has farmed in this area for more than 200 years. A few dozen hectares of his farm have remained unploughed and every spring and summer - when his neighbours are out in the heat battling with heavy machinery and cursing poor rains - he wanders around this farmland with tourists in tow, explaining to them about the wonder of the place.

Fossil evidence suggests that the Succulent Karoo vegetation could have evolved as recently as 12 000 years ago - a mere wink of geological time. According to Guy Midgley at the National Botanical Institute, climate change could bring it all to its knees much more quickly. By 2050, he maintains, temperatures could rise by about 3 ûC and rainfall decrease by about 10 per cent. The Cape Action Plan for People and the Environment (CAPE) is a coordinating body working with international funding bodies, government, private enterprise and the scientific community towards the preservation of the Cape Floral King-dom. One of its initiatives, based on the recommendations of Richard Cowling and other botanists, is the creation of reserves that will be large enough and have sufficient altitudinal variation to allow plants to respond to the environmental changes envisaged.

Mega reserves, which will stretch from mountains to the sea and embrace a broad profile of vegetation types, are planned for various parts of South Africa, including Namaqualand. It's a vast undertaking, but the salvation of one of the world's natural treasures is at stake. Its protection starts with learning - and teaching others - to look behind the postcards.

NAMAQUALAND -WHEN TO VISIT
August and September are usually the best months to see the flowering annuals, the diversity of species and insect activity. In early autumn amaryllids such as Haemanthus and Brunsvigia can be seen.

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