See text Cyclopia, the honeybush, or heuningbos in Afrikaans, is a genus of some 20 species of flowering plants in the legume family Fabaceae, subfamily Faboideae.

There are dozens of species of honeybush tea found in the wild, of which about four or five are in widespread home or commercial use.

It is not always easy to discover what the seeds need to enable them to germinate; some kinds bear elaiosomes and might be dependent on the services of particular ants or birds.

In the traditional method, the leaves of the bush are harvested, cut and bruised (often with mechanical rollers), and then left in the sun to oxidise.

The modern, industrialised process oxidises the leaves in rotating, heated tanks at temperatures of 70–90 °C for two to three days.