Plants of South Eastern New South Wales

Glossostigma elatinoides

Flowering stems. Photographer Rosemary Purdie, Cotter River, ACT

Carpet. Photographer APB, Williamsdale, ACT

Common name

Small mud-mat

Family

Phrymaceae

Where found

Woodland, grassland, river flats, lake margins, beside freshwater swamps, and seasonally inundated depressions, in mud or water. Tablelands and ACT. Rarely elsewhere.

Notes

Perennial herb to 0.05 m high, mat-forming, rooting along the stems. Leaves opposite each other, sometimes clustered, 0.2–2 cm long, 1–3 mm wide, green, hairless, sometimes sparsely hairy, base gradually or abruptly narrowed into the leaf stalk, midvein apparent on lower surface. Flowers to 6 mm in diameter, blue to pale mauve with a greenish yellow centre, 2-lipped, tubular, the tube 2–3.5 mm long, with 5 lobes. Flowers single. Flowering: October–May.

All native plants on unleased land in the ACT are protected.

PlantNET description:  http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Glossostigma~elatinoides  (accessed 22 January, 2021)