Sporobolus natalensis(Steud.) T.Durand & Schinz

WFO wfo-0000901353 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 3 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 3 times, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Sporobolus natalensis, photographed by Tony van Kampen
fig. a Tony van Kampen, CC BY 4.0 / 2020-03-26 / obs. 64684148
Sporobolus natalensis, photographed by Tony van Kampen
fig. b Tony van Kampen, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 64684145
Sporobolus natalensis, photographed by Tony van Kampen
fig. c Tony van Kampen, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 64684413
Sporobolus natalensis, photographed by Tony van Kampen
fig. d Tony van Kampen, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 86336394
Sporobolus natalensis, photographed by Tony van Kampen
fig. e Tony van Kampen, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 64389150
Sporobolus natalensis, photographed by Tony van Kampen
fig. f Tony van Kampen, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 64682995
Sporobolus natalensis, photographed by Tony van Kampen
fig. g Tony van Kampen, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 64389151
Sporobolus natalensis, photographed by Tony van Kampen
fig. h Tony van Kampen, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 64388652

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 16 botanical countries

Regions where Sporobolus natalensis is native: Angola, Botswana, Cameroon, Cape Provinces, DR Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, KwaZulu-Natal, Namibia, Northern Provinces, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Saudi Arabia, Yemen AngolaBotswanaCameroonCape ProvincesDR CongoEritreaEthiopiaKenyaKwaZulu-NatalNamibiaNorthern ProvincesTanzaniaUgandaZambiaSaudi ArabiaYemen
Native distribution of Sporobolus natalensis, 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
Botswana BOT
Cameroon CMN
Cape Provinces CPP
DR Congo ZAI
Eritrea ERI
Ethiopia ETH
Kenya KEN
KwaZulu-Natal NAT
Namibia NAM
Northern Provinces TVL
Tanzania TAN
Uganda UGA
Zambia ZAM
Saudi Arabia SAU ASIA-TEMPERATE
Yemen YEM

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.

Also published as 5 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.

  • Sporobolus capensis var. laxus Nees
  • Sporobolus indicus f. laxus (Nees) Peter
  • Sporobolus indicus var. laxus (Nees) Stapf
  • Sporobolus kwiluensis Vanderyst
  • Vilfa natalensis Steud.

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.