Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Ozothamnus cupressoides
Common name
Kerosene Bush, Scaly Everlasting
Family
Asteraceae
Where found
Woodland, heath, grassland, along streams, and boggy sites, at high altitude. Kosciuszko National Park and the ACT.
Notes
Shrub to about 1.2 m high. Branches white-hairy, sometimes sticky, the surface of the branchlets hidden by the closely appressed leaves. Leaves aromatic when rubbed, alternating up the stems, crowded, scale-like, 0.1–0.38 cm long, 0.5–1.7 mm wide, upper surface green and sticky, lower surface white-tomentose, tips rounded, margins strongly rolled down and more or less concealing the lower surface. Flower heads cylindrical, 3.5–5 mm long, 1–2 mm in diameter, Florets 2–6. 15–22 bracts appressed to the flower heads, outer bracts thin and dry, yellow-green or straw-coloured, inner bracts white. Flower heads in dense hemispherical to almost spherical clusters of 3–35 heads at the tops of the stems. Flowering: summer–autumn. Highly inflammable, but after burning usually recovers more densely than before.
Separated from Ozothamnus hookeri, which now only occurs in Tas.
All native plants on unleased land in the ACT are protected.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Ozothamnus~cupressoides (accessed 29 January, 2021)
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