About
Contact
Links
Electronic Flora of South Australia
Electronic Flora of South Australia
Census of SA Plants, Algae & Fungi
Identification tools
 

Electronic Flora of South Australia species Fact Sheet

Family: Amaranthaceae
Sclerolaena decurrens

Citation: A.J. Scott, Reprium nov. Spec. Regni veg. 89:112 (1978).

Synonymy: Bassia decurrens J. Black, Trans. R.Soc. S. Aust. 46:567 (1922); Austrobassia decurrens (J. Black) Ulbr., Natürl. Pflanzenfam. edn 2, 16c:532 (1934).

Common name: Green copperburr.

Description:
Small dense shrub to 30 cm high; branches loosely woolly; leaves semiterete, 5-10 mm long, acute, appressed-hirsute to glabrous, glossy; hairs medifixed, with the distal arm longer than the proximal.

Flowers solitary; perianth moderately pilose; stamens 5.

Fruiting perianth hard, glossy; attachment slightly oblique, more or less circular, depressed, c. 1.5 mm diam.; tube shortly turbinate, ribbed, c. 1.5 mm high and c. 2 mm broad at the apex, glabrous; limb oblong, erect, exceeding the tube, thin, sparsely pilose towards the apex; spines 2 or 3, 2 of these opposite and divergent, 5-7 mm long, 1 radicular and 2.5 mm or less or this reduced to a tubercle, the radicular canal produced into a flange which is decurrent down the tube as a prominent rib; seed erect.

image of FSA1_Sclerolaena_dec.jpg Sclerolaena decurrens fruit
Image source: fig. 169m in Jessop J.P. & Toelken H.R. (Ed.) 1986. Flora of South Australia (4th edn).

Published illustration: Cunningham et al. (1982) Plants of western New South Wales, p. 251.

Distribution:  S.Aust.: NW, LE, GT, FR, EA, EP, MU.   N.T.; Qld; N.S.W.; Vic.

Conservation status: native

Flowering time: Flowers and/or fruits: April — Sept.


SA Distribution Map based
on current data relating to
specimens held in the
State Herbarium of South Australia

Biology: No text

Taxonomic notes: S. oppositicuspis (Ising) A.J. Scott, Reprium nov. Spec. Regni veg. 89:113 (1978) is probably a hybrid between S. decurrens and S. intricata.-Bassia oppositicuspis Ising, Trans. R. Soc. S. Aust. 88:86 (1964).

Author: Not yet available


Disclaimer Copyright Disclaimer Copyright Email Contact:
State Herbarium of South Australia
Government of South Australia Government of South Australia Government of South Australia Department for Environment and Water