Pourpier à Grandes Fleurs

From the sandy, stony ground of southern Brazil, Uruguay and Argentina, it grows where almost nothing holds on: bare soil, open wind, hard heat and little rain.

Its genus is the only one known to run two photosynthetic engines in the same plant, C4 in normal conditions and CAM under drought, when it closes its stomata by day. Its colours come from betalains, the pigments of beetroot, which is why it reaches oranges and magentas few flowers can make.