Mimetes splendidus Knight

An erect rather sparsely branched shrub to 2.5 m in height with a single main trunk to 60 mm in diam. Bark thin, smooth, grey with horizontal striations. Branches stiffly erect when young, usually very sparsely branched, 6-10 mm in diam., sericeous; drooping in old shrubs. Leaves sessile, ascending-imbricate, broadly lanceolate to elliptic, 40-55 mm long, 12-25 mm wide, densely silvery-sericeous, apices subacute, usually dentate with 3-4 reddish-amber callus teeth, occasionally entire with a single apical callosity. Inflorescences 80-120 mm long, 60-80 mm wide, flattened apically with a coma of small reduced, silvery-pink flushed leaves. Capitula 10-14-flowered, subtended by a prominently cucullate, basally auriculate, anteriorly conduplicate leaf, flushed brilliant orange-pink during anthesis. Involucral bracts broadly ovate to obovate-oblong, obtuse, glabrous to minutely puberulous, margins ciliate; papyraceous in texture when dry; pale yellowish-amber when fresh, subhyaline incurved and loosely clasping the base of the perianths, 12-18 mm long, 7-10 mm wide. Floral bracts linear, 12-16 mm long 2 mm wide, densely sericeous. Perianth 30-35 mm long; tube slightly inflated, 3-4 mm long, glabrous; claws filiform, sericeous but crisped proximally; limbs 8-10 mm long, linear-cymbiform, acute, densely sericeous, but crinite apically. Style 45-55 mm long, straight, filiform. Pollen presenter linear-acute, 5-7 mm long, annulate at junction with style, stigmatic groove obliquely terminal. Ovary ovoid, 1 mm long, densely sericeous. Hypogynous scales linear-subulate, 2 mm long, bright orange in live state. Fruits narrowly ellipsoid, 6-7 mm long, 4-5 mm wide. Flowering takes place in mid-winter with the peak of the flowering season being from late May until early July. Ripe fruits are shed approximately eight months after flowering, usually in January or February, depending on the elevation and microclimate of each particular population.