Plants of South Eastern New South Wales

Maireana humillima

Fruiting plant. Australian Plant Image Index, Photographer Murray Fagg, Yathong Nature Reserve near Mt Hope, NSW

Seed cases and leaves. Australian Plant Image Index, Photographer Murray Fagg, Australian National Botanic Gardens, Canberra, ACT

Fruiting plant. Photographer Richard Hartland, Terrick Terrick, Vic

Line drawing. i. seed case. M Moir, National Herbarium of Victoria, © 2021 Royal Botanic Gardens Board

Common name

None

Family

Where found

Range of vegetation species. Colonising species. Western Slopes.

Notes

Perennial herb with a woody base, to 0.2 m tall, or prostrate or sprawling. Leaves with sharp tips. Stems hairy. Leaves alternating up the stems, 0.5-2 cm long, 1.5-3 mm wide, covered with tawny hairs. Flowers tubular, with 5 'petals', subtended by a pair of small bracteoles, immersed in cottony hairs. Flowers single. Seed cases cream to greenish or golden yellow or tinged pink, brown when dry, 10–12 mm in diameter, tubular, the tube conical, 3–4 mm in diameter at the tips, firm and rather thick-walled, hairy on the upper side of the body and horizontal wing, hairless below. Horizontal wing with a radial fold which sometimes develops into a slit.

PlantNET description:   http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Maireana~humillima (accessed 24 January, 2021)