Plants of South Eastern New South Wales

Leptospermum rupicola

Flowering stems. Australian Plant Image Index, photographer Murray Fagg, Australian National Botanic Gardens, Canberra, ACT

Common name

A tea-tree

Family

Myrtaceae

Where found

Shrubby communities and heath on sandstone cliffs and escarpments. Mountains west of Sydney.

Notes

Shrub to 1 m high. Leaves with sharp points. Bark rough. Younger stems with long appressed hairs, becoming hairless, and with a conspicuous flange, extended rather than curving around the stem. Leaves aromatic when rubbed, alternating up the stems, about 1–2 cm long and 1–3 mm wide, surfaces becoming hairless, bases gradually tapering, stalkless. Flowers 10–12 mm in diameter, with 5 white petals, single. Flowers Mar.–May and Sept.-Oct. Nuts long persistent, 6-10 mm in diameter, surface ultimately gnarled.

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

Additional information in: Thompson, J. (8 December 1989), A revision of the genus Leptospermum (Myrtaceae). Telopea 3(3): 420-421, map 8-61