Hibiscus sturtii commonly known as "hill hibiscus",[1] is a flowering plant in the family Malvaceae. It is a small shrub with pink, mauve or white flowers, hairy grey-green leaves and is endemic to Australia. Two forms are recognized; var. sturtii and var. muelleri.[2]
Hibiscus sturtii is a small understory shrub to high, occasionally prostrate, grey-green leaves thickly covered in star-shaped hairs, egg to lance-shaped or oblong-lance shaped, long, rounded at the apex and the petiole long. The pink, mauve or white flower petals may have a dark basal spot, corolla long, calyx lobes lance or triangular shaped, long and the peduncle long. Flowering occurs from autumn to spring and the fruit is a densely hairy globular capsule long.[1] [3]
Hibiscus sturtii was first formally described in 1848 by William Jackson Hooker and the description was published in Journal of an Expedition into the Interior of Tropical Australia.[4] [5] The specific epithet (sturtii) is in honour of explorer Charles Napier Sturt.[6]
Hill hibiscus grows in a variety of soils and locations on mainland Australia except Victoria.[7] [8]