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Leucopogon R.Br.
Prodromus Florae Novae Hollandiae p541 (1810)
Name Status: Current
Scientific Description
H.R. Coleman,
Friday 3 October 2008
Family Epacridaceae.
Habit and leaf form. Small trees, or shrubs; evergreen; leptocaul, or pachycaul. Helophytic to xerophytic. Leaves minute to medium-sized; alternate, or whorled; spiral, or four-ranked; ‘herbaceous’, or leathery; imbricate, or not imbricate; usually sessile, or petiolate; non-sheathing; simple. Leaf blades entire; flat, or rolled; palmately veined, or parallel-veined (in L. sect. Heteranthus); cross-venulate, or without cross-venules. Leaves without stipules. Leaf blade margins flat, or revolute. 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’; in spikes, or in racemes. Inflorescences terminal, or axillary. Flowers bracteate; bi- bracteolate; small; fragrant, or odourless; regular; 5 merous; cyclic; tetracyclic. Free hypanthium absent. Hypogynous disk present; intrastaminal; annular, or of separate members (5 scales). Perianth with distinct calyx and corolla; 10; 2 -whorled; isomerous. Calyx 5; 1 -whorled; polysepalous; imbricate; regular; persistent. Corolla 5; 1 -whorled; gamopetalous; lobed (lobes spreading or reflexed); valvate; regular; glabrous abaxially; hairy adaxially (lobes bearded inside with white woolly hairs); white, or pink; persistent, or deciduous. Androecium 5. Androecial members adnate (to the corolla); all equal; free of one another; 1 -whorled. Androecium exclusively of fertile stamens. Stamens 5. Staminal insertion in the throat of the corolla tube. Stamens remaining included, or becoming exserted (partially); isomerous with the perianth; oppositisepalous; all alternating with the corolla members. Filaments glabrous; short, slender, terete. Anthers basifixed, or adnate; 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); unilocular, or bilocular; bisporangiate; unappendaged (but their apices in L. ‘A’ sterile-tipped, generally paler and often recurved). Pollen shed in aggregates, or shed as single grains; without viscin strands; in tetrads. Gynoecium 2–5 carpelled. The pistil 2–5 celled. Gynoecium syncarpous; eu-syncarpous; superior. Ovary plurilocular; 5 locular, or 2–5 locular (or more in L. sect. Heteranthus). Gynoecium stylate. Styles 1; either very short or long and slender; attenuate from the ovary; apical; becoming exserted, or not becoming exserted. Stigmas 1; lobed; truncate, or clavate, or capitate. Placentation apical. Ovules 1 per locule; pendulous; non-arillate; anatropous.
Fruit and seed features. Fruit fleshy, or non-fleshy; indehiscent; a drupe. The drupes with one stone. Seeds endospermic. Endosperm oily. Seeds wingless. Embryo well differentiated. Cotyledons 2. Embryo straight. Seedling. Germination phanerocotylar.
Physiology, biochemistry. Aluminium accumulation not found. Photosynthetic pathway: C3.
Geography, cytology, number of species. Native of Australia. Not endemic to Australia. Australian states and territories: Western Australia, South Australia, Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, and Tasmania. South-West Botanical Province.
Additional characters Prophylls few.
Taxonomic Literature
Hislop, Michael (2008). Three new species of Leucopogon (Ericaceae: Styphelioideae) from the far south- west of Western Australia. Dept. of Environment and Conservation. [Kensington, W.A.].
Hislop, Michael Chapman, Alex R. (2007). Three new and geographically restricted species of Leucopogon (Ericaceae : Styphelioideae : Styphelieae) from south-west Western Australia. 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.
Marchant, N. G. (1987). Flora of the Perth region. Part 1. Western Australian Herbarium. [South Perth].
Strid, Arne K. (1986). New species of Leucopogon and Conostephium (Epacridaceae) from SW Australia. Botanischer Garten und Botanisches Museum Berlin-Dahlem. Berlin.
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.
