Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Euphorbia paralias
Common name
Sea spurge
Family
Euphorbiaceae
Where found
On sandy soils near the sea. Shrubland, heath, grasslands and coastal herbfields, beaches, coastal dunes, and in sand in cracks between rocks on rocky shorelines. Coastal south from Jervis bay. Rarely farther north.
Notes
Perennial herb to about 0.70 m high growing from a woody base. Stems somewhat fleshy, hairless, glaucous, with a milky sap. Leaves crowded, overlapping each other, 0.5–3 cm long, 2–15 mm wide, fleshy, tips pointed to blunt, bases often slightly cordate, margins entire. Male and female flowers on the same plant. Flowers yellowish green, tiny, with 0 petals, in small heads that look like a single flower, each head with several male flowers surrounding 1 female flower. Flower heads single, the bracts subtending them cup-shaped. Glands at the base of the female flowers orange, obvious. Flowers Sep.–June. Seed cases 4.5-6 mm in diameter.
General Biosecurity Duty all NSW. General Biosecurity Duty with additional restrictions in the Greater Sydney area and the South East area of NSW
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Euphorbia~paralias (accessed 22 January, 2021)
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