Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Melichrus erubescens
Common name
Ruby Urn Heath
Family
Ericaceae
Where found
Forest, woodland, shrubland, and rocky outcrops. Western Slopes. Occasionally elsewhere.
Notes
Shrub to 1.2 m high. Fruit fleshy. Leaves sharp pointed. Branchlets hairy, with prominent leaf scars. Leaves alternating up the stems, crowded towards the ends of the stems, 1.1–3 cm long, 1.4–4.2 mm wide, hairless or finely rough, deeply 8–16-ribbed on lower surface, margins finely toothed. Flowers pink to deep red, tubular, the tube cup-shaped, 2.5–3.8 mm long, with 5 spreading lobes 1.5–2.2 mm long. Flowers single at the bases of the leaves, almost hidden among the leaves, forming leafy clusters. Flowering: February–October. Fruit red, flattened round, 4–5 mm long, finely ribbed.
Family was Epacridaceae.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Melichrus~erubescens (accessed 24 January, 2021)
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