Eulophia tenella

Eulophia tenella, sometimes commonly called the thicket harlequin and in Zulu intongazimbovana, is a slender perennial, a terrestrial orchid reaching heights from 15 cm to 60 cm.

Leaves and a flower stem are grown from a moniliform rhizome (shaped like a string of beads). The leaves are fully developed at flowering time, becoming from 10 cm to 42 cm long, only 2 mm to 6 mm wide.

The species distribution is mostly coastal in the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal, the plant also growing in the Mpumalanga Lowveld and some easterly parts of Zimbabwe.

The habitat is grassy fynbos in the southern extreme of the plant’s distribution, the eastern reaches of the Cape Floristic Region. Further to the north it is found in summer rainfall grassland and thornveld. Fire stimulates flowering in this Eulophia. The habitat population is deemed of least concern early in the twenty first century (Liltved and Johnson, 2012; Pooley, 1998; iNaturalist; http://redlist.sanbi.org).