Pimelea macrostegia explained

Pimelea macrostegia is a species of flowering plant in the family Thymelaeaceae and is endemic to Kangaroo Island in South Australia. It is a shrub with glabrous, narrowly elliptic leaves and clusters of pale yellow flowers surrounded by 4 or 6 egg-shaped, pale green involucral bracts.

Description

Pimelea macrostegia is a shrub that typically grows to a height of and has glabrous stems. Its leaves are narrowly elliptic, long and wide on a short petiole. The flowers are pale yellow and arranged in clusters of 50 to 90 on a peduncle long. There are 4 or 6 pale green, sometimes also purplish, egg-shaped or broadly egg-shaped involucral bracts, mostly long and wide around the flower clusters, each flower on a hairy pedicel. The sepals are long, the floral tube long, and the stamens longer than the sepals. Flowering occurs from November to February.[1] [2]

Taxonomy

This pimelea was first formally described in 1873 by George Bentham, who gave it the name Pimelea ligustrina var. macrostegia in Flora Australiensis, based on specimens collected in "sandy scrub" on Kangaroo Island by Frederick George Waterhouse.[3] [4] In 1925, John McConnell Black raised the variety to species status as Pimelea macrostegia in Transactions and Proceedings of the Royal Society of South Australia.[5] [6] The specific epithet (macrostegia) means "large roofed".[7]

Distribution and habitat

Pimelea macrostegia grows in sandy scrub or shrubland on Kangaroo Island in South Australia.

Notes and References

  1. Web site: Rye . Barbara L. . Pimelea macrostegia . Flora of Australia. Australian Biological Resources Study, Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment: Canberra . 2 February 2023.
  2. Web site: Pimelea macrostegia . State Herbarium of South Australia . 2 February 2023.
  3. Web site: Pimelea ligustrina var. macrostegia. APNI. 2 February 2023.
  4. Book: Bentham . George . Flora Australiensis . 1873 . Lovell Reeve & Co. . London . 19 . 2 February 2023.
  5. Web site: Pimelea macrostegia. APNI. 2 February 2023.
  6. McConnell . John M. . Additions to the Flora of South Australia . Transactions and Proceedings of the Royal Society of South Australia . 1925 . 49 . 275 . 2 February 2023.
  7. Book: Sharr . Francis Aubi . George . Alex . Western Australian Plant Names and Their Meanings . 2019 . Four Gables Press . Kardinya, WA . 9780958034180 . 246 . 3rd.