Morning glories all fall into the Ipomoea family and after the heavy rains of the last 2 months, the invasive members of the family have grown madly and they are all flowering. Morning glory is a serious pest in South Africa because it smothers all other vegetation. They are native to many parts of the world, including South Africa but the indigenous species aren't invasive here. First sown in South Africa because of the beauty of their flowers, they soon grew out of control. They are beautiful and here are a selection of the flowers that are currently blooming all over.
These are all variants of the common bindweed Ipomoea purpurea, with heart-shaped leaves
This is a different species, Ipomoea indica
The difference is immediately apparent in the leaf shape:
Although people think that the blue form of morning glory contains compounds similar to LSD, this isn't true. There are some hallucinogenic members of this plant group but that's not it.
