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Manual of the New Zealand Flora.

2. Scutellaria, Linn

2. Scutellaria, Linn.

Annual or perennial herbs or undershrubs. Flowers solitary or in pairs, axillary or in terminal racemes or spikes. Calyx campanulate, 2-lipped; lips entire, closed in fruit, the upper one bearing on its back a broad concave deciduous scale. Corolla-tube long, dilated above; limb 2-lipped, the upper one concave, entire or emarginate, the lower convex, dilated, 3-lobed. Stamens 4, didy-namous; anthers conniving in pairs, ciliate, lower 1-celled, upper 2-celled. Upper lobe of the style very short. Nutlets small, granular-tuberculate or smooth.

A large genus of about 100 species, found in most parts of the world, but most abundant in America. The New Zealand species is endemic, but is closely allied to the Australian S. humilis, R. Br.

1.S. novæ-zealandiæ, Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. ii. 335.—Stems slender, creeping and rooting at the base, erect or ascending above, sparingly branched, sparsely pilose or almost glabrous, 5–15 in. high. Leaves in distant pairs, on slender petioles ¼–¾ in. long; blade page 569⅙–½ in., from ovate or ovate-oblong to orbicular or reniform, 3–5-lobed or -crenate or quite entire. Flowers ¼–⅓in. long, white, solitary in the axils of the upper leaves; peduncles usually longer than the calyx, often secund. Calyx short, minutely pubescent; lips obtuse, rounded; scale at first shorter than the upper lip, but becoming much larger in fruit. Corolla pubescent, about twice as long as the calyx; lower lip rather longer than the upper one; lobes obtuse. Anthers glabrous.—Handb. N.Z. Fl. 226. S. humilis, Hook.f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 205 (not of R. Br.).

South Island: Nelson—Maitai Valley and other localities near Nelson, T. F. C.; Foxhill, Bidwill, Monro, T. F. C. Marlborough—Pelorus and Tinline Valleys, MacMahon!

Apparently a rare and local plant. It has been recorded from Banks Peninsula and Flagstaff Hill, near Dunedin, but I believe erroneously.