Trochocarpa disticha is a flowering plant species of the family Ericaceae and is endemic to Tasmania. It is a tall shrub with slender branches, its leaves egg-shaped to narrowly lance-shaped and arranged in two opposite rows (distichous), reddish flowers in curved spikes with bell-shaped petal tubes, and deep to pale purple drupes.
Trochocarpa disticha is a shrub that typically grows to a height of up to, with thin, spreading branches and branchlets with longitudinal grooves. The leaves are arranged in two opposite rows, egg-shaped to narrowly lance-shaped, long and often reddish, with 3 to 5 veins on the lower surface. The flowers are arranged in down-curved spikes long with small bracts and bracteoles about half as long as the sepals. The sepals are long and the petals are joined at the base to form a bell-shaped tube long, the lobes shorter than the tube. Flowering occurs from September to October and the fruit is a pale to deep purple drupe in diameter.[1]
This species was first formally described in 1805 by Jacques Labillardière who gave it the name Cyathodes disticha in his Novae Hollandiae Plantarum Specimen.[2] [3] In 1824, Kurt Polycarp Joachim Sprengel transferred the species to Trochocarpa as T. disticha in Systema Vegetabilium.[4] The specific epithet (disticha) means "in two rows or lines".[5] This species closely resembles T. cunninghamii, which has larger leaves, and could be confused with T. gunnii which has smaller leaves than this species.[6]
Trochocarpa disticha is endemic to Tasmania and can be found in the rainforests of the far southeast mostly below 400m, but is uncommon.