Stapeliopsis khamiesbergensis Bruyns

Small rhizomatous succulent to 300 mm diam. Stems 30-200 mm long, 3-20 mm thick, decumbent with horizontal (and often very slender) portion spreading up to 100 mm underground, silvery green to green with purplish mottling, minutely papillate (glabrous to naked eye); tubercles 1-3 mm long, broadly deltoid, laterally flattened and joined near base into 4 narrowly obtuse angles along stem, tapering abruptly to minute conical tooth. Inflorescence glabrous, usually developing at level of surface of soil or beneath it, with several lanceolate bracts up to 1 mm long on short broad peduncle (occasionally up to 30 mm long); pedicel 2-3 mm long, 1 mm thick, purplish, spreading then sometimes erect, holding flower facing upwards or outwards; sepals 3 mm long, 0.5 mm broad at base, lanceolate, acuminate, with spreading apices. Corolla 10-12 mm long, 5-7 mm diam., urceolate with somewhat flattened base; outside finely papillate, dull purple-maroon; inside maroon in tube, dull yellow on lobes, densely covered with conical obtuse papillae on inside of tube only, longest (up to 0.5 mm) towards mouth and shortest towards base, each with an apical bristle (very short in upper half of tube, up to 2 mm long in lower half); tube 10-12 mm long, 5-7 mm broad around middle narrowing to 2 mm inside slightly thickened mouth, ovoid; lobes 2.5 mm long, 1.5-2.0 mm broad at base, erect to spreading, deltate, acute. Corona 5 mm tall, 5 mm broad, raised on low circular stipe <1 mm long and ±5 mm broad narrowing abruptly above into gynostegium, purplish red, glabrous; outer lobes ±3 mm tall, fused laterally with sides of inner lobes into vase-shaped tube <2 mm broad at base widening to 5 mm broad at apex, with pairs of nearly erect deltoid lobules 0.6 mm long at mouth of tube alternating with inner lobes; inner lobes 3 mm long, erect and then connivent at obtuse apices, laterally flattened, slightly broadened in lower half but otherwise without dorsal appendage.