Plants of South Eastern New South Wales

Xanthorrhoea media

Flowers on stalk. Australian Plant Image Index, photographer Murray Fagg, Lake Macquarie Conservation Area, Lake Macquarie

Flowering stalks. Australian Plant Image Index, photographer Murray Fagg, Lake Macquarie Conservation Area, Lake Macquarie

Flowering plant. Australian Plant Image Index, photographer Murray Fagg, Lake Macquarie Conservation Area, Lake Macquarie

Common name

A grass-tree

Family

Xanthorrhoeaceae

Where found

Dry forest on sandstone, usually on drier, more exposed ridges and hillsides. Coast, ranges, and Southern Higlands, north from east of Marulan.

Notes

Shrub-like perennial herb, trunk absent or to 0.3 m high. Trunk with a pithy core surrounded by the flattened glossy bases of old leaves. Scape below the spike 1–2.1 m long, 7–11 mm in diameter, flower spike 0.35–0.90 m long, 20–27 mm in diameter. Leaves basal or clustered at the top of the trunk, forming a usually single approximately hemispherical crown. Leaves 2–2.8 mm wide, 1.1–1.5 mm thick, mid to dark green, not glaucous, diamond shaped in cross section. Individual flowers with 6 'petals' in two rows, outer 'petals' papery or more or less membranous, inner 'petals' membranous. Bracts surrounding the flowers almost obscure, sometimes at the base of the spike only, pointed to narrow-triangular, and hairy on the lower surface. Bracts between the flowers pointed, and hairless to moderately hairy. Flowering: August–March.

Protected NSW.  

PlantNET description:  http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Xanthorrhoea~media (accessed 12 February, 2021)