Dietes iridioides(L.) Sweet ex Klatt

WFO wfo-0000789349 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Dietes iridioides, photographed by Tony Rebelo
fig. a Tony Rebelo, CC BY-SA 4.0 / 2022-05-20 / obs. 204165679
Dietes iridioides, photographed by Presha Soogrim
fig. b Presha Soogrim, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 195399310
Dietes iridioides, photographed by Margaret Burger
fig. c Margaret Burger, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 193879634
Dietes iridioides, photographed by Matthew Fainman
fig. d Matthew Fainman, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 173582050
Dietes iridioides, photographed by Matthew Fainman
fig. e Matthew Fainman, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 173385570
Dietes iridioides, photographed by Matthew Fainman
fig. f Matthew Fainman, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 173003448
Dietes iridioides, photographed by Dr. Alexey Yakovlev
fig. g Dr. Alexey Yakovlev, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 674794858
Dietes iridioides, photographed by Di Turner
fig. h Di Turner, CC0 1.0 / obs. 166079959

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

Native range 15 botanical countries

Regions where Dietes iridioides is native: Angola, Cape Provinces, DR Congo, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Kenya, KwaZulu-Natal, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Northern Provinces, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe AngolaCape ProvincesDR CongoEswatiniEthiopiaKenyaKwaZulu-NatalLesothoMalawiMozambiqueNorthern ProvincesTanzaniaUgandaZambiaZimbabwe
Native distribution of Dietes iridioides, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Angola ANG AFRICA
Cape Provinces CPP
DR Congo ZAI
Eswatini SWZ
Ethiopia ETH
Kenya KEN
KwaZulu-Natal NAT
Lesotho LES
Malawi MLW
Mozambique MOZ
Northern Provinces TVL
Tanzania TAN
Uganda UGA
Zambia ZAM
Zimbabwe ZIM

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Flowering 178 in flower of 190 examined

Peak flowering in Jan. Each bar is the share of Dietes iridioides observations in which someone actually recorded the reproductive state and found the plant in flower, not the raw number of flowering records. That distinction matters: people observe plants far more in spring than in winter, so a bare count of flowering records partly measures when people go outside. Dividing by the number examined removes that. 178 of 190 examined observations were in flower, every one of them research grade. The whisker on each bar is a 95% Wilson interval. This is still a global aggregate and not a forecast for your garden: the same species flowers on different dates in different hemispheres. Where a species has fewer than 30 flowering records we do not draw this chart at all. Computed from 10.15468/dl.cgje2x.

Also published as 21 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Dietes catenulata (Lindl.) Sweet ex Klatt
  • Dietes compressa (L.f.) Klatt
  • Dietes crassifolia G.Don
  • Dietes iridifolia Salisb.
  • Dietes iridioides (L.) Sweet
  • Dietes macleae Baker
  • Dietes prolongata (Baker) N.E.Br.
  • Dietes prolongata var. galpinii N.E.Br.
  • Ferraria blanda Salisb.
  • Iris catenulata (Lindl.) Baker
  • Iris compressa L.f.
  • Iris compressa Thunb.
  • Iris moraeoides Ker Gawl.
  • Moraea catenulata Lindl.
  • Moraea iridioides L.
  • Moraea iridioides var. catenulata (Lindl.) Baker
  • Moraea iridioides var. prolongata Baker
  • Moraea irioides Gaertn.
  • Moraea prolongata Baker
  • Naron iridioides (L.) Moench
  • Naron orientale Medik.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.