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Manual of the New Zealand Flora.
7. Notothlaspi, Hook. f
7. Notothlaspi, Hook. f.
Small fleshy simple or branched alpine herbs, glabrous or slightly hairy. Leaves all radical, or radical and cauline, spathulate, petiolate. Flowers rather large, white, densely crowded in a terminal raceme, or corymbose at the tips of the branches. Sepals; erect, equal at the base. Petals spathulate. Pods rather large, obovate or oblong, much compressed, valves very broadly winged. Seeds numerous in each cell, reniform, attached by slender long funicles. Cotyledons incumbent; radicle often very long.
The genus is confined to the mountains of the South Island of New Zealand.
Stem simple. Flowers densely crowded on a stout terminal peduncle or scape. Style very short 1. N. rosulatum. Stem usually much branched. Flowers corymbose at the ends of the branches. Style long 2. N. australe.
| 1. | N. rosulatum, Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. 15. — A very remarkable stout erect leafy pyramidal fleshy herb 3–9 in. high; stem very short or almost wanting. Leaves all radical, very numerous, most densely crowded, fleshy, imbricated, forming a rosette page 43or cushion, spathulate, crenate or dentate, when young clothed with white cellular ribband-like hairs, glabrous or nearly so when old, narrowed into a petiole of variable length. Scape very stout, sometimes as thick as the finger, covered with densely crowded sweet-scented flowers, forming a conical or pyramidal raceme, Pods ½–1 in. long, obovate, very broadly winged, notched at the top; style very short; stigma 2-lobed. Seeds numerous, subreni-forrn, pitted; radicle very long, twice folded, first upwards then downwards and backwards over the back of the cotyledons.— Kirk, Students' Fl. 38. N. notabile, Buch, in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xiv. (1882) 344, t. 25.
South Island: Nelson and Canterbury—Not uncommon on dry shingle-slopes on the mountains, but easily overlooked. Otago—Mount Ida, P. Goyen. Altitudinal range 2000–5000 ft. December–February. One of the most singular plants in the colony. When in flower or fruit it has a conical or pyramidal shape; but flowerless specimens form rosettes or cushions of closely packed imbricating leaves, from which no doubt has arisen the local name of "penwiper plant." The flowers are deliciously fragrant. |
| 2. | N. australe, Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. 15.—Small, densely tufted, usually much branched from the base; branches leafy, spreading, 1–4 in. long. Leaves radical and cauline, numerous, ½–1½ in. long, petiolate, linear-or oblong-spathulate, entire or crenate, glabrous or with a few cellular hairs, often recurved. Flowers very numerous, corymbose, about ¼ in. diam. Pod much smaller than in the preceding species, ⅓–½ in. long, broadly oblong or elliptic, winged, barely notched at the top; style long, almost ⅓ the length of the pod. Seeds numerous, pitted; radicle long, slender.—Kirk, Students' Fl. 38. Thlaspi (?) australe, Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. ii. 325.
Var. stellatum, Kirk, l.c. 39. — Stems not branched. Leaves narrow linear-spathulate; petioles pubescent. Flowers numerous, on long 1-flowered peduncles. South Island: Nelson—An abundant plant on the mountains, from 2500 to 5000 ft. Var. stellatum: Mount Rintoul, F. G. Gibbs, W. H. Bryant.A pretty little plant, originally discovered by Sir David Monro. Although very common in the Nelson District, it has not been observed further south than Lake Tennyson. |