Biodiversity Garden - Visitors and Evaluation

Is the interpretive signage in the Biodiversity Garden effective?
It is not an easy thing to evaluate, but I would say people are reading them. However the degree of interpretation part is harder to evaluate. A few storyboards in the Garden engage the reader directly - e.g. Look up to Signal hill - and so when you see someone looking up at the hill, then it's working.

I noticed these two ladies read almost every single sign in the People and Plants theme area, and looked pretty absorbed. The lady in black was leaning forward - means the text is a bit too small.

I just missed the moment: when this lady bent down to pick and smell a piece of wild rosemary - as invited by the storyboard: Reach out to the wild rosemary bush in front of you. Squeeze some leaves gently and smell your fingers. Would you cook with this herb?
John Roff was instrumental in co-writing the texts and finding opportunities to engage visitors. I find this kind of interpretation in action rewarding and exciting!


A cold misty morning (13 degrees) and yet there was a group of school kids in the garden.

Here Wendy Hitchcock is with a school group on another cold morning - playing a climate change game. I heard a roar of excitement and later I heard from Wendy that they were cheering for the roll of the dice which would create a mass extinction!


The visitor's book is almost full. Many comments refer to people feeling proud of our City and what it has achieved (in the Park). There are hundreds of thank yous - a wonderful sense of gratitude.

And then there are the visitors of a different kind: a bee collecting pollen from the sour fig, Carpobrotus acinaciformis. Plus 2 other insects.

I was wondering why some climbers on the Dome had no leaves? One of the Kirstebosch guides pointed out this fat fellow - about 10cm long and as thick as a fat cigar. I wonder what moth or butterfly it will turn into?

Visitors from the Stellenbosch municipality testing the Exercise equipment. And a small sample of folk going through the Biodiversity Garden last Friday, 19th May:







On misty mornings the Garden is bejewelled with spider webs...it's magical.


Our goal is that people leave the Biodiversity Garden with an understanding of biodiversity and why we need it; a love for our natural heritage and the desire to care for it for future generations.

Are we achieving this goal? How does one measure whether it's working?
Although we've had a positive response from the public (in the visitor comments book, on radio phone-ins, emails, during guided walks) it remains a tricky thing to measure. How does one evaluate 'love' and a desire to care?

And the 'understanding of biodiversity' - how does one test someone's knowledge without putting them on the spot?

I would welcome any ideas you may have.

Walk above Llandudno

Thursday afternoon we went for a sunset walk from Suikerbossie up Hout Bay corner to Llandudno Ravine. The views are spectacular - first over the Houtbay valley:


And once you've ascended Hout Bay corner, views over Little Lions Head and Llandudno. There are a few places where one has to scramble or climb - with the aid of stainless steel handles - so the Mickey dog needed some help.


Much to our surprise we came across a Himalayan Tar - obviously one which the rangers missed out during the relocation programme a few years ago. It was a male, and totally unafraid of our presence. Min gepla. I didn't know whether to look at the tar or the bird of prey sitting on the rock above!


I noticed the tar browsed a few leaves of the Wild Camphor, Tarconanthus camphoratus. So much for the plant producing aromatics and secondary compounds as a defence against animals!


Once we rounded the corner we were on the exposed west side. I noticed a distinct increase in succulents (Cotyledon, mesembs and Tylecodon grandiflora, in flower) and some shrubs, notably Coleonema, were looking stressed, with yellow leaves, all rolled up. March is a tough month for fynbos.



I made a bee-line for the shade in Lekkerwater Gulley, where we enjoyed a sunset drink of water and some fruit. I'd love to go back and continue to Judas Peak next time, returning via Myburgh Ravine.

Looking back along Eureka Face towards Karbonkelberg and beyond.

Looking in the other direction, towards Oudekraal are steep slopes clothed in fynbos, as far as the eye can see, with a totally unspoilt coastline. It is wild and inaccessible - untamed Nature.

Peter Slingsby, who has created such an informative map series of the Peninsula, writes:
These very very empty slopes - perhaps the least frequented parts of the whole of the Cape Peninsula - are mostly private property and not conserved as part of the National Park.

May we hope that this truly untracked wilderness within the City boundary remains forever for future generations as a tiny glimpse of this whole Peninsula as it was before 1652.

I feel incredibly fortunate to live in a City with such natural beauty and biodiversity - right on our doorstep.

In the garden

My garden is blessed with many chameleons - probably due to the absence of cats and pesticides. I am absolutely fascinated by these creatures - when I see one, I just have to take a pic.

I'm not the best chameleon spotter: I usually see them just as I'm about to prune or chop something down! - in this case agapanthus. Needless to say I put my secateurs away, and grabbed my camera instead.

The Cape Dwarf chameleon gives birth to live young and I do sometimes see a bunch of litte ones all on one bush. Technically they are ovoviviparous - i.e. they produce eggs but retain them inside the female body until hatching occurs. According to Vincent Wagner (The Life of the Chameleon, 1983):

Each baby is extruded separately, the process taking 5 to 20 seconds, in a fairly tight-fitting membranous bag, with its tail wrapped around itself...The parent prefers to be on a horizontal or sloping, fairly thick branch, so that the bag is deposited on it. With a few convulsive wriggles the young chameleon immediately breaks the bag and climbs out... At 2 to 5 min intervals the female produces the rest of the family, and then unconcernedly walks off, and forgets all about them. The baby has a body 12mm long and a tail 18mm long.

Now that is something to look out for!

The number of young produced varies, but is often around a dozen. There appears to be no fixed season for birth, and there may be more than one litter per year.

The Common Chameleon (found in the northern parts of SA) lays her eggs in soil - usually about 4 times as many as the Dwarf Chameleon. They are laid in March and take 10 months to mature.

Fascinating - these different reproductive strategies.

Orange Kloof Walk

I am very lucky to have a friend who has a research permit for Orange Kloof which means we can walk there without an guide. Saturday morning we set off, up Constantia Corner which offers lovely views over Hout Bay and Orange Kloof (on the right of the pic).




I've been up Constantia Corner many times, and we did the same walk a year ago, so the plant populations en route are familiar to me - it felt like I was checking up on old friends.



My favourite part is right on top of the mountain, with grassy-restiod fynbos and those sculptural sandstone rocks - and no sign of the City or human habitation. We had coffee and croissants at the rock shelter.


Then past Camel Rock and the Overseer's hut (now some kind of Hoerikwagga lodge, complete with surburban latte fence) and over the Hely Hutchinson dam wall...



Finally we dropped down into Disa Gorge into the resticted Orange Kloof. The wall is made of the local grey sandstone which has been beautifully hewn into massive rectangular blocks. I admit I have a penchant for bold feats of engineering like bridges, dams and stone aqueducts in wild landscapes. They have a scale and sculptural quality which appeals to my senses.



Not the same dam wall, but another one close by, showing the quality of the stone work (March, 2010).


The path drops into a forested kloof, and for a little while the vegetation is lush and the extra moisture is tangible. Here is Marie, on our walk a year ago.

This time Mike and I stopped for a few flowering disas, but my eye was irresistably drawn to the pretty new foliage of Blechnum.

Red Disa, Disa uniflora

Why do we always take pictures of the perfect flower? Here is the one next door: it think it's pollinia were eaten - noshed by a hungry beetle rather than removed by its delicate pollinator, the Mountain Pride butterfly.


Along the way Mike kept a count of Mountain Pride butterflies - he had eight sightings in all. Meneris tulbaghia is the sole pollinator of a guild of orange and red flowered fynbos species which flower between November and March. The butterfly is unusual in that it one of few insects that can see red in the visible spectrum - and is therefore the sole insect pollinator of these red-flowered plant species. I have seen it swoop down on a red backpack or hiker's socks, and even a red Opel Kadett!

Along our path and on the butterfly's menu, so to speak, were: Crassula coccinea, Red Disa (Disa uniflora) and Tritoniopsis triticea.

Crassula coccinea, Klipblom

Although we didn't see the Cluster Disa (Disa ferruginea), this species is also visited by the Mountain Pride Butterfly. It is interesting that the disa doesn't offer a nectar reward and mimics Tritoniopsis, a nectar-producing irid. When the butterfly visits the Cluster disa, and sticks its proboscis down the floral tube in search of nectar, there's nada! nothing there - but the disa deposits its sack of pollen (pollinia) on the butterfly. It's trickery and deceit in action.

Further along the way there is a nice stand of Leucadendron strobilinum - another endemic to Table Mountain. Fynbos is characterised by its high degree of endemism, so this is not unusual - in fact I can be a bit blase about it. But actually it is remarkable that this species is found only on this mountain and nowhere else in the world. Thank god it is fairly well-protected in the Table Mountain NP (if they finally get round to urgent alien clearing and erosion control in the Park).


Leucadendron strobilinum is easy to recognise by the fringe of silky white haris on the leaf margins.

Along the way we came across this chap - no idea what he's called. Methinks I need to acquire a reptile book...

A Party of a lifetime

In December my friend celebrated his 60th birthday at the Two Oceans Aquarium with a sleep-over party. Pat is a passionate and sucessful marine biologist and Director of the Aquarium, so it could not have been a more fitting place to celebrate. We had supper in front of the Predator Tank and after the festivities, people dragged their matresses to wherever they liked.


I slipped off into the Diversity Hall and entered an enchanted world...




It was absolutely quiet except for the rhythmic swoosh! of the intertidal exhibit and aircon. There were no throngs of people, or screaming kids - just a silent, colourful world of the most beautiful and bizarre creatures.

The ethereal streamers of box jellyfish

We decided to make our nest in front of the Shark Tank, lit by moonlight. The fish all swim in a clockwise direction around a central rock: there were strong, powerful yellowtails, enormous white stumpnose, grunter, sting rays, a turtle and a few large ragged-tooth sharks, circling among their prey.


I was absolutely mesmerised by a school of shimmering mackerel which scattered nervously in front of the predatory fish. Apparently the size of the school has diminished considerably over the last few months as they are snacked between feeding times.

Next morning we woke up and shafts of sunlight lit the tank.



What an incredible experience and priviledge. Thank you Pat!