Cyclopia buxifolia
(Burm. f.) Kies
Bush tea
iNaturalist · cc-by-nc
(c) Nick Helme, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Nick Helme
(c) Nick Helme, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Nick Helme
iNaturalist · cc-by-nc
(c) Nick Helme, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Nick Helme
(c) Nick Helme, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Nick Helme
What to Eat
Edible parts: Leaves - tea
The leaves are used to make an attractive tea drink.
Where to Find It
It is a Mediterranean climate plant. It can grow in arid places.
Africa, South Africa*, Southern Africa,
Countries: Angola, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Benin, Botswana, Congo (DRC), Central African Republic, Congo (Republic), Cote d'Ivoire, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Djibouti, Algeria, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Gambia, Guinea, Equatorial Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Comoros, Liberia, Lesotho, Libya, Morocco, Madagascar, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Seychelles, Sudan, Sierra Leone, Senegal, Somalia, South Sudan, Sao Tome & Principe, Eswatini, Chad, Togo, Tunisia, Tanzania, Uganda, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe
How to Identify
Bush tea is a shrub in the Fabaceae family adapted to Mediterranean climates and arid places.
Other Information
It makes an attractive tea drink.
Names & Synonyms
Cyclopia cordifolia Benth.Cyclopia latifolia Benth.Cyclopia latifolia DC,Genista buxifolia Burm. f.
References (7)
- Fox, F. W. & Young, M. E. N., 1982, Food from the Veld. Delta Books. p 225
- Plowes, N. J. & Taylor, F. W., 1997, The Processing of Indigenous Fruits and other Wildfoods of Southern Africa. in Smartt, L. & Haq. (Eds) Domestication, Production and Utilization of New Crops. ICUC p 189
- Ruiters-Welcome, A. K., 2019, Food plants of southern Africa. Ph.D. thesis. Univ. of Johannesburg p 57
- Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (1999). Survey of Economic Plants for Arid and Semi-Arid Lands (SEPASAL) database. Published on the Internet; http://www.rbgkew.org.uk/ceb/sepasal/internet [Accessed 28th April 2011]
- van Wyk, Ben-Erik, 2019, The diversity and multiple uses of southern African legumes. Australian Systematic Botany, 2019, 32, 519–546
- Welcome, A. K. & Van Wyk, B.-E., 2019, An inventory and analysis of the food plants of southern Africa. South African Journal of Botany 122 (2019) 136–179
- World Checklist of Useful Plant Species 2020. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
