Leucopogon malayanus subsp. novoguineensis (Sleumer) Pedley

Ericaceae

Pedley, L. (1990) Austrobaileya 3: 271.

Usually grows into a small multistemmed windswept tree but also flowers and fruits as a shrub.

Leaves +/- sessile, very variable in size, about 40-120 x 8-20 mm. Venation longitudinal and parallel with about 8-12 main veins but no obvious midrib.

Flowers in spikes. Calyx lobes about 2 x 1.9 mm, margins hairy. Corolla lobes about 3 x 1 mm. Staminal filaments about 1.5 mm long, anthers about 0.6 x 0.2 mm. Ovary 8-10-locular. Style about 0.9 mm long.

Fruits depressed globular, about 5-6 x 7-9 mm diam. Calyx persistent at the base. Endocarp greenish, clothed in mainly fibrous tissue, depressed globular, about 4-5 x 5-7 mm, ribbed like a pumpkin (Cucurbita spp.). Up to ten seeds in the endocarp, each seed attached by a long funicle. Embryo slightly curved, cotyledons very small, much shorter than the radicle and scarcely as wide.

Cotyledons oblong-elliptic, about 5.5-7 x 1.5 mm. First pair of leaves linear, narrower than the cotyledons, venation longitudinal. At the tenth leaf stage: leaf blade linear, about 5-7 x 0.5-1 mm, sessile, venation longitudinal. Stem clothed in short erect hairs. Seed germination time 77 days.

Occurs in NEQ, known only from a few collections from the Mt Bartle Frere, Pinnacle Rock and Mt Spurgeon areas. Altitudinal range from 950-1200 m. Grows in windswept mountain rain forest usually on granite. Also occurs in New Guinea.

Styphelia malayana var. novoguineensis Sleumer, Blumea 12: 148(1964), Type: New Guinea, slope of the Makanoi Ra., above Kotanica, 600-700 m, 17-7-1961, van Royen & Sleumer 6200.