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Andersonia R.Br.
Prodromus Florae Novae Hollandiae p553 (1810)
Name Status: Current
Scientific Description
H.R. Coleman,
Friday 3 October 2008
Family Epacridaceae.
Habit and leaf form. Small shrubs; evergreen. To 1 m high. Leptocaul, or pachycaul. Helophytic to xerophytic. Leaves minute to small; alternate; spiral; ‘herbaceous’, or leathery; imbricate; sheathing, or non-sheathing. Leaf sheaths when present, with free margins. Leaves simple. Leaf blades entire; flat; palmately veined, or parallel-veined (ostensibly so, the parallel veins in the lamina originating palmately from a single leaf trace); cross-venulate, or without cross-venules. Leaves without stipules. Leaf blade margins flat. Stem anatomy. Nodes unilacunar. Secondary thickening developing from a conventional cambial ring.
Reproductive type, pollination. Fertile flowers hermaphrodite. Unisexual flowers absent. Plants hermaphrodite. Entomophilous, or ornithophilous. Pollination mechanism unspecialized.
Inflorescence and flower features. Flowers solitary, or aggregated in ‘inflorescences’; when solitary, axillary (each flower in a leaf or bract axil with only 1 pair of bracteoles, often fascicled into heads). Inflorescences terminal (then the flowers subtended by a series of bracts or bracteoles which become increasingly sepal-like towards the sepals). Flowers bracteate; bracteolate; small; fragrant, or odourless; regular; 5 merous; cyclic; tetracyclic. Free hypanthium absent. Hypogynous disk present; intrastaminal; annular (and 5-lobed), or of separate members (5 scales). Perianth with distinct calyx and corolla; 10; 2 -whorled; isomerous. Calyx 5; 1 -whorled; polysepalous; imbricate; exceeding the corolla (usually), or more or less equalling the corolla; regular; white, or pink, or purple, or blue; persistent. Corolla 5; 1 -whorled; gamopetalous; lobed (lobes recurved, deflexed or incurved). Corolla lobes markedly shorter than the tube (usually), or about the same length as the tube, or markedly longer than the tube. Corolla valvate; tubular (tube cylindric or contracted above the ovary); regular; hairy adaxially; white, or pink, or purple, or blue; persistent, or deciduous. Androecium 5. Androecial members free of the perianth; all equal; free of one another; 1 -whorled. Androecium exclusively of fertile stamens. Stamens 5; sometimes exserted; isomerous with the perianth; oppositisepalous; all alternating with the corolla members. Anthers attached below the middle or adnate nearly to the base; becoming inverted during development, their morphological bases ostensibly apical in the mature stamens; non-versatile; dehiscing via longitudinal slits (by a single median slit); finally introrse (inverting during development); bisporangiate; unappendaged. Pollen shed in aggregates, or shed as single grains; without viscin strands; in diads, or in triplets, or in tetrads. Gynoecium 5 carpelled. The pistil 5 celled. Gynoecium syncarpous; eu-syncarpous; superior. Ovary plurilocular; 5 locular. Ovary summit glabrous or puberulous. Gynoecium stylate. Styles 1; from a depression at the top of the ovary; apical. Stigmas 1; truncate, or clavate, or capitate. Placentation axile. Ovules 3–15 per locule; pendulous; non-arillate; anatropous.
Fruit and seed features. Fruit non-fleshy; dehiscent; a capsule. Capsules loculicidal. Seeds ellipsoid; endospermic. Endosperm oily. Seeds small; wingless. Embryo well differentiated. Cotyledons 2. Embryo straight. Testa reticulate. Seedling. Germination phanerocotylar.
Physiology, biochemistry. Aluminium accumulation not found. Photosynthetic pathway: C3.
Geography, cytology, number of species. Native of Australia. Endemic to Australia. Australian states and territories: Western Australia. South-West Botanical Province. N = 13 or 12.
Additional characters Prophylls few, or numerous.
Taxonomic Literature
Lemson, Kristina L. (2007). New species of Andersonia (Ericaceae) of conservation concern. Dept. of Environment and Conservation. [Kensington, W.A.].
Wheeler, J.R. Marchant, N. G. Lewington, Margaret Graham, Lorraine Western Australian Herbarium (2002). Flora of the south west : Bunbury - Augusta - Denmark. Volume 2 : Dicotyledons. ABRS and W.A. Herbarium in association with UWA Press. Canberra.
Lemson, Kristina L. (1996). Current problems in the taxonomy of Andersonia R.Br.. Academic Press. London.
Marchant, N. G. (1987). Flora of the Perth region. Part 1. Western Australian Herbarium. [South Perth].
Blackall, William E. Grieve, Brian J. (1981). How to know Western Australian wildflowers : a key to the flora of the extratropical regions of Western Australia. Part 3B. University of Western Australia Press. Nedlands, W.A.
