Phaleria chermsideana (F.M.Bailey) C.T.White

Thymelaeaceae

White, C.T. (1919) Queensland Department of Agriculture and Stock. Botany Bulletin 21: 19.

Scrub Daphne

Grows into a small tree but probably does not exceed 30 cm dbh. Sometimes flowers and fruits as a shrub.

Leaf blades about 7-8 x 2.5-3.5 cm, petioles about 0.5-0.6 cm long. Lateral veins forming loops inside the blade margin. Twig bark strong and fibrous, emitting a faint hydrocyanic odour when stripped.

Umbels about 4-10-flowered. Peduncle about 2-20 mm long. Flowers +/- sessile. Perianth tube (hypanthium) about 8-17 mm long. Tepals about 3-6 mm long, alternating with five indistinct glands or lobes. Stamens attached near the apex of the perianth tube (hypanthium), filaments about 2 mm long. Pollen yellow. Ovary +/- surrounded by a glandular cupule, about 0.5 mm long. Style about 12-14 mm long. Stigma large, globular to cylindrical.

Fruit about 10-15 mm long. Endocarp tough and fibrous. Seeds ovoid, about 7 x 3.5 mm.

Features not available.

Occurs in NEQ, south-eastern Queensland and north-eastern New South Wales. Altitudinal range in NEQ from 700-1100 m. Grows as an understory plant in mountain rain forest or on the boundary of mountain rain forest and wet sclerophyll forest.

A bushy shrub or small tree with glossy dark green leaves and fragrant white flowers. It is becoming more common in cultivation.

Leucosmia chermsideana F.M.Bailey, Queensland Agric. J. 14: 35(1904), Type: Queensland, Killarney, J. Wedd; syn; Beechmont, Oct. 1918, C. England; syn: NSW.