Calocephalus lacteus, commonly known as lemon beauty-heads,[1] is a species of flowering plant in the family Asteraceae. It has yellow cylindrical shaped flowers and grey stems and grows in the eastern states of Australia
Calocephalus citreus is a perennial herb with upright, slender, light grey, fuzzy, slightly angular stems growing to about high. The leaves are arranged usually opposite, linear to lance-shaped, mostly long, wide and covered with short, matted, dense hairs and prominent veins. The heads are solitary, oblong to globose shaped, about long, lemon-coloured in bud, bright yellow in flower. The 8-11 bracts are flat, conduplicate, long with 2-3 florets per head. Flowering occurs from September to March and the fruit is a cypsela long, brown, and the upper surface covered in fine, feathery bristles.[1] [2]
Calocephalus citreus was first formally described in 1832 by Christian Friedrich Lessing and the description was published in Synopsis Generum Compositarum.[3] [4] The specific epithet (citreus) means "lemon-coloured".[5]
Lemon beauty-heads grows in low-lying areas in herbfields, dry forest and grassy woodland in eastern states of Australia and the Australian Capital Territory.[6]