Lobelia telekii is a species of flowering plant

Flowering plant

The flowering plants , also known as Angiospermae or Magnoliophyta, are the most diverse group of land plants. Angiosperms are seed-producing plants like the gymnosperms and can be distinguished from the gymnosperms by a series of synapomorphies...

 in the bellflower

Campanula

Campanula is one of several genera in the family Campanulaceae with the common name bellflower. It takes its name from their bell-shaped flowers—campanula is Latin for "little bell"....

 family, Campanulaceae

Campanulaceae

The family Campanulaceae , of the order Asterales, contains about 2000 species in 70 genera of herbaceous plants, shrubs, and rarely small trees, often with milky non-toxic sap...

, that is found only in the alpine zone

Alpine tundra

Alpine tundra is a natural region that does not contain trees because it is at high altitude. Alpine tundra is distinguished from arctic tundra, because alpine soils are generally better drained than arctic soils...

s of Mount Kenya

Mount Kenya

Mount Kenya is the highest mountain in Kenya and the second-highest in Africa, after Kilimanjaro. The highest peaks of the mountain are Batian , Nelion and Point Lenana . Mount Kenya is located in central Kenya, just south of the equator, around north-northeast of the capital Nairobi...

, Mount Elgon

Mount Elgon

Mount Elgon is an extinct shield volcano on the border of Uganda and Kenya, north of Kisumu and west of Kitale.- Physical features :It is the oldest and largest solitary volcano in East Africa, covering an area of around 3500 km²....

, and the Aberdare Mountains of East Africa

East Africa

East Africa or Eastern Africa is the easterly region of the African continent, variably defined by geography or geopolitics. In the UN scheme of geographic regions, 19 territories constitute Eastern Africa:...

. It lives at high altitudes on well-drained sloped hillsides. It is a semelparous species, putting all its reproductive effort into producing single large inflorescence

Inflorescence

An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Strictly, it is the part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed and which is accordingly modified...

 up to 3 metres (10 ft), and then dying. The plant is named after the Austro-Hungarian explorer, Count Sámuel Teleki

Sámuel Teleki

Count Sámuel Teleki de Szék was a Hungarian explorer who led the first expedition to Northern Kenya. He was the first European to see, and name, Lake Rudolf .-Early life:...

.

L. telekii plants usually consist of a single rosette, which grows for several decades, flowers once, and then dies. However, a very small number of plants have multiple rosettes connected by an underground stem. Each flower is subtended by a long hairy bract, and the overall appearance has led to the nickname "Cousin Itt

Cousin Itt

Cousin Itt is a member of the fictional Addams Family. Unlike the other characters, Cousin Itt was not originally created by cartoonist Charles Addams, but by producer David Levy, though he did appear as an unnamed character in Addams's cartoons.- Character :...

 lobelia".

The bird

Bird

Birds are feathered, winged, bipedal, endothermic , egg-laying, vertebrate animals. Around 10,000 living species and 188 families makes them the most speciose class of tetrapod vertebrates. They inhabit ecosystems across the globe, from the Arctic to the Antarctic. Extant birds range in size from...

-pollinated

Pollinator

A pollinator is the biotic agent that moves pollen from the male anthers of a flower to the female stigma of a flower to accomplish fertilization or syngamy of the female gamete in the ovule of the flower by the male gamete from the pollen grain...

 flower

Flower

A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproductive structure found in flowering plants . The biological function of a flower is to effect reproduction, usually by providing a mechanism for the union of sperm with eggs...

s of L. telekii are hidden among the large bracts within the inflorescence

Inflorescence

An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Strictly, it is the part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed and which is accordingly modified...

. The leaves and bracts are blue-green, and the flowers purple. Each flower can produce up to several hundred small (<1mm diameter) dark seeds, which are passively dispersed.
On Mount Kenya

Mount Kenya

Mount Kenya is the highest mountain in Kenya and the second-highest in Africa, after Kilimanjaro. The highest peaks of the mountain are Batian , Nelion and Point Lenana . Mount Kenya is located in central Kenya, just south of the equator, around north-northeast of the capital Nairobi...

, Lobelia telekii lives at elevations of 3500–5000 m (11,482.9–16,404.2 ft). It inhabits the drier hill slopes, while its close relative Lobelia keniensis prefers the moister valley bottoms. Hybrids do occur. The hill slopes often have rocky moraines that are home to Mount Kenya rock hyrax, which sometimes eat lobelia leaves and inflorescences
, but herbivores are generally deterred by the lobelia's bitter toxic sap, which contains alkaloid

Alkaloid

Alkaloids are a group of naturally occurring chemical compounds that contain mostly basic nitrogen atoms. This group also includes some related compounds with neutral and even weakly acidic properties. Also some synthetic compounds of similar structure are attributed to alkaloids...

s, including lobeline

Lobeline

Lobeline is a natural alkaloid found in "Indian tobacco" , "Devil's tobacco" , "cardinal flower" , "great lobelia" , and Hippobroma longiflora...

.