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Scientific Name | Hermas lanata (Hill) Magee |
Higher Classification | Dicotyledons |
Family | APIACEAE |
Synonyms | Hermas pillansii C.Norman, Scabiosa lanata Hill |
Common Names | Table Mountain Tinder-leaf (e) |
National Status |
Status and Criteria | Vulnerable D1+2 |
Assessment Date | 2015/04/20 |
Assessor(s) | N.A. Helme, L. von Staden & A.R. Magee |
Justification | A highly localized (EOO 14 km²) habitat specialist, and apparently extremely rare, it is suspected that the population consists of fewer than 1 000 mature individuals. It is possibly threatened by habitat degradation as a result of high volumes of recreational use of Table Mountain. |
Distribution |
Endemism | South African endemic |
Provincial distribution | Western Cape |
Range | Cape Peninsula. |
Habitat and Ecology |
Major system | Terrestrial |
Major habitats | Peninsula Sandstone Fynbos |
Description | Shallow, slightly damp soil pockets on upper vertical cliffs and shady, moist, west-facing kloofs. |
Threats |
| It is uncertain what exactly the threats are to this species, but it appears to have declined. It is one of the Cape's earliest known plants, first illustrated in 1685 (Burtt 1981), and thus it is suspected that, although a habitat specialist, it probably was not extremely rare. Growing among large rocks on steep slopes, it is supposedly safe from most types of human impact, however, the extreme proliferation of recreational rock climbing and hiking all across Table Mountain could perhaps have led to the degradation of H. pillansii's habitat. |
Population |
An apparently extremely rare and localized habitat specialist, and known from only a few collections. Repeated searches at known localities in the past have failed to relocate any subpopulations, however, recently, surveys on Table Mountain relocated two subpopulations, one consisting of only five plants.
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Population trend | Unknown |
Assessment History |
Taxon assessed |
Status and Criteria |
Citation/Red List version | | Hermas lanata (Hill) Magee | VU D1+2 | 2015.1 | | Hermas pillansii C.Norman | Rare | 2011.1 | | Hermas pillansii C.Norman | Rare | Raimondo et al. (2009) | |
Bibliography |
Burtt, B.L. 1981. The strange history of Hermas pillansii. Boletim da Sociedade Broteriana 53(2):1233-1240.
Burtt, B.L. 1991. Umbelliferae of southern Africa: an introduction and annotated check-list. Edinburgh Journal of Botany 48(2):133-282.
De Villiers, B.J. 2003. A revision of the genus Hermas. Unpublished B.Sc.Hons., Rand Afrikaans University, Johannesburg.
Goldblatt, P. and Manning, J.C. 2000. Cape Plants: A conspectus of the Cape Flora of South Africa. Strelitzia 9. National Botanical Institute, Cape Town.
Magee, A.R., De Villiers, B.J., Van Wyk, B.-E. and Tilney, P.M. 2015. A revision of the South African genus Hermas (Apiaceae). Systematic Botany 40(1):352-265.
Norman, C. 1928. Novitates Africanae: Hermas pillansii. Journal of Botany 66:195.
Raimondo, D., von Staden, L., Foden, W., Victor, J.E., Helme, N.A., Turner, R.C., Kamundi, D.A. and Manyama, P.A. 2009. Red List of South African Plants. Strelitzia 25. South African National Biodiversity Institute, Pretoria.
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Citation |
| Helme, N.A., von Staden, L. & Magee, A.R. 2015. Hermas lanata (Hill) Magee. National Assessment: Red List of South African Plants version . Accessed on 2025/04/13 |
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