Because fynbos soil is rather infertile, nutrients to survive are very scarce. Plants need to be very efficient in locating and absorbing those that are available and use them to their best advantage. Specialised nutrient-uptake mechanisms have evolved in many fynbos plants and others have formed symbiotic partnerships with bacteria and fungi.

Bacteria stimulate the production of nodule outgrowths on the roots of certain species, which enables the host plant to absorb nitrogen that would otherwise be unavailable. It also stimulates the production of dense rootlets to improve the uptake of ions.

An unusual way for a plant of coping with nutrient poverty is carnivory. The sundews trap and digest insects by way of sticky glandular hairs on their leaves. Fynbos also has about a hundred species of root parasites, which derive their nutrients from the roots of other species.

SURVIVING THROUGH THE DRY, HOT SUMMER

Fynbos occurs in the Mediterranean region of the country, which has winter rainfall. Yet these plants show little sign of stress during the long, dry summer months, when the soil is depleted of moisture.

STRANGE FACTS

Some fynbos plants have a pungent smell, which evolved to discourage herbivores. The leaves of the blister bush, on the other hand, contain a substance that causes blisters on the skin of people who brush past it, also to deter herbivores.

Fynbos plants balance their water content when soil moisture is low by conserving energy, much like the human inhabitants of Mediterranean climates. They metabolise energetically in the early morning, rest through the hot midday and resume activity in the late afternoon.

Fynbos plants also have variations in their rooting systems to cope with drought. Some have long taproots that grow to great depths and others have shallow, fibrous roots that capture whatever water there is near the soil surface. In this way they can coexist within a small area without competing with each other for water.

The leaves of fynbos plants have characteristics that enable them to cope with excessive solar radiation. Some have epidermal hairs that increase the sheen of the leaf, thereby making it more reflective.

FIRE - AN ESSENTIAL LIFE-GIVING ELEMENT 

Strange as it may seem, by the time a fynbos community has reached the age of about 15 years since the last fire, it is ready to burn. All the species have flowered and set seed for several successive years by then.

Although fire is seen as a destructive power, in the fynbos community it is an essential event, which provides new opportunities for organisms to regenerate, produce offspring and then die back in anticipation of the next fire. If there are no fires for lengthy periods, some species, such as proteas, start degenerating.

 WHY DOES FYNBOS BURN?

On average most fynbos plant communities burn every 12 to 15 years. This frequency is determined by the rate at which vegetation grows or the fuel load accumulated after the previous fire. The fuel load is the amount and arrangement of flammable vegetation. Slow decomposition results in enough fine dead material on the ground to carry a fire, thereby increasing the flammability of fynbos. In addition, some plants produce high levels of secondary compounds that make them more flammable.

Firstly, it is flammable. Secondly, it experiences long periods when the weather is suitable for fires. Thirdly, there are numerous sources for ignition - hikers know that fynbos makes excellent firewood. Before humans invaded the fynbos region, fires were started by lightning or by rockfalls.

In relatively fertile sites where rainfall is higher, like the seaward slopes of coastal mountains, fynbos may burn only three years after the last fire especially in hot, windy and dry conditions. This would also depend on the availability of ignition sources.

Sometimes, when a species becomes critically rare, the Department of Forestry will initiate a controlled burn to regenerate new plants. Immediately after a fire, certain species start resprouting and the seeds of most species germinate during the first 12 months after a fire. Some sprouting species start flowering and set seed.