Xylosma ovata Benth.

Bentham, G. (1863), Flora Australiensis 1: 108. Type: "Queensland. N.E. coast, A. Cunningham.”

Shrub or small tree to 5 m high, bark fawn to greyish. Stems minutely hairy becoming hairless.

Leaves simple, alternate. Stipules 2, free, ovate, 0.4-0.8 mm long. Petiole 2-3 mm long. Leaf blades ovate-elliptic, rarely obovate, 2-5 cm long, 1-2.5 cm wide, base cuneate to obtuse, margin entire, crenate or toothed, apex shortly acute to obtuse. Venation of 4-6 pairs of lateral veins. Domatia absent. Surfaces hairless. Basal and marginal glands not present.

Inflorescences axillary, flowers in racemes, sometimes short and clustered, or solitary. Flowers unisexual, dioecious, actinomorphic, 4-merous. Tepals (sepals) 4, free or shortly connate at base, outer pair ovate, inner pair broadly obovate-orbicular, c. 1 mm long; disc flat, c. 7 lobed. Male flowers with 10-12 stamens present, filaments glabrous c. 1.3 mm long; rudimentary ovary ± present. Female flower with staminodes absent; ovary glabrous, superior, style very short with 2 bilobed stigmas.

Fruit fleshy, ovoid-globose, about 5 mm diameter, red, with 1-4 seeds embedded in flesh of fruit.

Features not available.

Occurs in CEQ, in coastal areas between the Whitsunday Islands and Agnes Waters (SE of Gladstone). Grows in littoral rainforest and vine thickets.

This profile information and associated coding has been adapted from Jessup (1982) and Harden et al. (2014).