Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Platylobium parviflorum
Common name
A Flat Pea
Family
Fabaceae
Where found
Dry forest and woodland. Coast and ranges. One record from the tablelands just east of the ACT on the Monaro Highway.
Notes
Shrub to about 2 m tall. Leaves opposite each other, leaves near the base of the shrub sometimes alternating up the stems. Leaves 2-6 cm long, 10-30 mm wide, bases never cordate, margins nearly flat to curved down; tips pointed to narrowly pointed, with an abrupt point to about 2 mm long, sometimes spine-like but not sharp, upper surface sometimes covered in minute warts, lower surface becoming hairless. Often no obvious junction between the leaf stalk and the leaf. Leaf stalks 1-4 mm long. Calyx 5-8 mm long. Standard petal 10-12 mm long. Flowers pea shaped, with 5 petals, 2 joined together to form the keel, yellow with red markings, the back of the standard petal purple-brown with narrow to broad yellow zones at the sides. The red-brown bracteoles (2.5-6 mm long) are 1-2 mm below the flower and may be hairy or hairless. The bracts (2.5-3.5 mm long) below the flower are hairless on the outside or with only a few midline hairs. Flowers in 1-3 flowered clusters. Flowers Spring.
Was Platylobium formosum subsp. parvifolium.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Platylobium~parviflorum (accessed 22 January, 2021)
Description partly based on: Thompson, I.R., (2011) A revision of Platylobium (Fabaceae: Bossiaeeae). Muelleria 29(2): 163-164, Figs 1, 2, 3
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