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Manual of the New Zealand Flora.
2. Poranthera, Rudge
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.
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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. page 629South 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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P. alpina, Cheesem. 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. |