Plants of South Eastern New South Wales

Pherosphaera fitzgeraldii

Male cones on leafy stem. Australian Plant Image Index, photographer Murray Fagg, Australian National Botanic Gardens, Canberra, ACT

Female cones on leafy stem. Australian Plant Image Index, photographer Murray Fagg, Australian National Botanic Gardens, Canberra, ACT

Plant. Photographer Peter Woodard, Mt Tomah, Blue Mouintains

Common name

Dwarf Mountain Pine, Blue Mountains Pine

Family

Podocarpaceae

Where found

Within the spray zone or associated drip lines and seepage areas of waterfalls on steep, sandstone cliffs and ledges. Katoomba to Wentworth Falls in the Blue Mountains.

Notes

Shrub to 1 m high with drooping branchlets, or sometimes with straggling branches and to 2 m diameter. Leaves spirally arranged, overlapping, 0.25–0.35 cm long, narrow, upper surface whitish; lower surface glossy green, gradually tapering to a fine tip, bases continuing down the stems for a short distance. Male cones oval to round, about 6 mm long, with 12-15 scales. Female cones about 3 mm long, with 4–8 scales.

Endangered Australia. Endangered NSW. Provisions of the NSW Biodiversity Conservation Act 2016 No 63 relating to the protection of protected plants generally also apply to plants that are a threatened species.

NSW Threatened Species profile:  http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/threatenedSpeciesApp/profile.aspx?id=10530 (accessed 7 January, 2021)

PlantNET description:  http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Pherosphaera~fitzgeraldii  (accessed 7 January, 2021)