Adenanthos cuneatus, also known as coastal jugflower, flame bush, bridle bush and sweat bush, is a shrub of the family Proteaceae, native to the south coast of Western Australia. The French naturalist Jacques Labillardière originally described it in 1805. Within the genus Adenanthos, it lies in the section Adenanthos and is most closely related to A. stictus. A. cuneatus has hybridized with four other species of Adenanthos. Growing to 2m (07feet) high and wide, it is erect to prostrate in habit, with wedge-shaped lobed leaves covered in fine silvery hair. The single red flowers are insignificant, and appear all year, though especially in late spring. The reddish new growth occurs over the summer.
It is sensitive to Phytophthora cinnamomi dieback, hence requiring a sandy soil and good drainage to grow in cultivation, its natural habitat of sandy soils in heathland being an example. Its pollinators include bees, honey possum, silvereye and honeyeaters, particularly the western spinebill. A. cuneatus is grown in gardens in Australia and the western United States, and dwarf and prostrate forms are commercially available.
Adenanthos cuneatus grows as an erect, spreading or prostrate shrub to 2m (07feet) high and wide. It has a woody base, known as a lignotuber, from which it can resprout after bushfire. The wedge-shaped (cuneate) leaves are on short petioles, and are 21NaN1 long and 1– wide, with 3 to 5 (and occasionally up to 7) rounded 'teeth' or lobes at the ends.[1] [2] New growth is red and slightly translucent. It glows bright red against the light, especially when the sun is low in the sky.[3] New growth is mainly seen in summer, and the leaves in general are covered with fine, silvery hair. Occurring throughout the year but more often from August to November, the insignificant single flowers are a dull red in colour and measure around 41NaN1 long.[1] [2] The pollen is triangular in shape and measures 31– in length, averaging around 34μm.[4]
The species is similar in many ways to its close relative A. stictus. The most obvious difference is in habit: the multi-stemmed, lignotuberous A. cuneatus rarely grows over 2m (07feet) in height, whereas A. stictus is a taller single-stemmed non-lignotuberous shrub that commonly reaches 5m (16feet) in height. Leaves are similar, but the lobes at the leaf apex are regular and crenate (rounded) in A. cuneatus, but irregular and dentate (toothed) in A. stictus.[5] Also, new growth does not have a red flush in A. stictus, and juvenile leaves of A. stictus are usually much larger than adult leaves, a difference not seen in A. cuneatus. The flowers of the two species are very similar, differing only subtly in dimension, colour and indumentum.[6]
Although the precise time and location of its discovery are unknown, Jacques Labillardière, botanist to an expedition under Bruni d'Entrecasteaux, which anchored in Esperance Bay on the south coast of Western Australia on 9 December 1792, most likely collected the first known botanical specimen of Adenanthos cuneatus on 16 December while searching the area between Observatory Point and Pink Lake for the zoologist Claude Riche, who had gone ashore two days earlier and failed to return. Following an unsuccessful search the following day, several senior members of the expedition were convinced that Riche must have perished of thirst or at the hands of the Australian Aborigines and counselled d'Entrecasteaux to sail without him. However, Labillardière convinced d'Entrecasteaux to search for another day, and was rewarded not only with the recovery of Riche, but also with the collection of several highly significant botanical specimens, including the first specimens of Anigozanthos (Kangaroo Paw) and Nuytsia floribunda (West Australian Christmas Tree) and, as aforementioned, A. cuneatus.[7] [8]
Thirteen years passed before Labillardière published a formal description of A. cuneatus, and in the meantime several further collections were made: Scottish botanist Robert Brown collected a specimen on 30 December 1801, during the visit of HMS Investigator to King George Sound;[9] and, fourteen months later, Jean-Baptiste Leschenault de La Tour, botanist to Nicolas Baudin's voyage of exploration,[10] and "gardener's boy" Antoine Guichenot[11] collected more specimens therein. The official account of Baudin's expedition contain notes from Leschenault on vegetation:
Labillardière eventually published the genus Adenanthos, along with A. cuneatus and two other species, in his 1805 Novae Hollandiae Plantarum Specimen. He chose the specific name cuneata in reference to the leaves of this species, which are cuneate (triangular).[5] [12] This name has feminine gender, consistent with the gender assigned by Labillardière to the genus.[13] He did not designate which of the three published species was to serve as the type species of Adenanthos, but Irish botanist E. Charles Nelson has since chosen A. cuneatus as lectotype for the genus, since the holotype of A. cuneatus bears an annotation showing the derivation of the genus name, and because Labillardière's description of it is the most detailed of the three, and is referred to by the other descriptions.[14]
In 1809, Richard Salisbury, writing under Joseph Knight's name in the controversial On the cultivation of the plants belonging to the natural order of Proteeae, published the name Adenanthes flabellifolia, listing A. cuneata as a synonym.[15] As no type specimen was given, and no specimen annotated by Knight could be found, this was treated as a nomenclatural synonym of A. cuneata and was therefore rejected on the principle of priority.[16]