2.
Poranthera, Rudge.
Annual or perennial herbs, sometimes woody at the base. Leaves narrow, alternate, stipulate. Flowers racemose or subum-bellate at the tips of the branches, or solitary in the axils of the upper leaves, monœcious or diœcious. Male flowers: Calyx deeply divided into 5 segments imbricate in the bud. Petals 5, small, sometimes wanting; anthers 4-celled, cells free, opening by terminal pores. Rudimentary ovary of 3 clavate bodies. Female flowers: Calyx and petals of the males. Stamens wanting. Ovary broad, 3-celled; styles 3, each divided into 2 linear branches; ovules 2 in each cell. Capsule depressed, globose, splitting into 3 2-valved cocci. Seeds reticulate; embryo terete, curved, cotyledons not broader than the radicle.
A small genus of 6 species, 5 of which are Australian, 1 of them extending to New Zealand. The remaining species is endemic in New Zealand.
Slender, diffusely branched. Leaves flat or nearly so. Flowers in terminal racemes |
1.
P. microphylla. |
Compactly branched. Leaves with the margins revolute to the middle. Flowers solitary in the upper axils |
2.
P. alpina. |
1. |
P. microphylla,
Brong. inDup. Voy. Coq. Bot. 218, t. 50b.— A slender perfectly glabrous herb; branches diffuse, 6–9 in. long, prostrate at the base, ascending at the tips. Leaves opposite or alternate,
¼–½ in. long, linear-obovate or spathulate, obtuse, gradually narrowed into a rather long petiole; margins flat or very slightly recurved. Flowers minute, greenish-white, in terminal bracteate racemes; bracts linear-subulate, lower ones exceeding the flowers. Petals linear, usually present in both sexes. Capsule membranous, depressed. Seeds small, brown, granulate.—
Benth. Fl. Austral. vi.
56;
Cheesem. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xi. (1879) 432.
South Island: Nelson—
Fagus forest in the Maitai Valley,
T. F. C. Kingsley! Marlborough—Pelorus and Tinline Valleys, abundant,
Macmahon! December–February.
Widely distributed in Australia and Tasmania.
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2. |
P. alpina, C
heesem. in Tr ans. N.Z. Inst. xiv. (1882) 300.— Perfectly glabrous, 2–5 in. high; branches numerous, decumbent or suberect, usually densely compacted and interlaced, rarely open, scarred, often somewhat woody at the base. Leaves all uniform, opposite, crowded, sessile or very shortly petiolate, ⅛–⅕ in. long, linear-oblong, obtuse, quite entire, smooth and veinless above; margins revolute, concealing the whole of the under-surface except the very thick and prominent midrib; stipules rather large, triangular. Flowers solitary in the axils of the upper leaves, forming short leafy heads, minute, greenish-white, diœcious; peduncles shorter than the leaves. Petals wanting in both sexes. Sepals 5, oblong, obtuse. Stamens shorter than the sepals; filaments slender. Ovary subglobose. 6-lobed, 3-celled. Capsule globose-depressed. —
Hook. /'.
in Hook. Ic. Plant, t. 1366b.
South Island: Nelson—Mount Arthur, Mount Owen,
T.F.C.; Mount Murchison,
Townson! 3000–5000 ft. December–January.
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