Nuytsia 8: 3 (1998) - FloraBase

Paul G. Wilson, Helipterum: Part 1
Erect herb to 25 cm high, branching at base. Principal axes slender, to 20 cm high, simple or
sparsely branched, glandular puberulous, pilose beneath capitulum. Leaves linear, 8-15 mm long,
c. 0.7 mm wide, glandular puberulous, margins slightly recurved. Involucre hemispherical, c. 10 mm
high and wide. Outer bracts broad-elliptic, hyaline, ciliate; stereome narrow-triangular, brown,
glandular puberulous. Innermost bracts: claw narrow-elliptic, c. 9 mm long, hyaline, ciliate, stereome
very narrow-oblong, glabrous except for the glandular puberulous apex; limb narrow-obovate, obtuse,
9-15 mm long, yellow. Corolla c. 5 mm long; tube narrow, glandular hirtellous with multicelled hairs;
limb narrow-turbinate, glabrous, shortly 5-lobed, papillose within below junction of lobes. Achene
compressed narrow-ellipsoid, c. 2.5 mm long, barbellate with 2-celled papillae; beak slender, smooth,
to 3 mm long. Pappus more or less equal to corolla, persistent, bristles united towards base to form
a tube c. 2 mm long.
Additional specimen examined. WESTERN AUSTRALIA: Hamelin Pool, 16 Sept. 1984, J. Colwill s.n.
(PERTH).
Habitat. Found on red sand over limestone (fide H. Demarz in sched.).
Distribution. Only known from near Hamelin Pool, c. 170 km south of Carnarvon, Western Australia.
Notes. Haptotrichion colwillii is very similar to H. conicum which is known from an area between
Carnarvon and Gascoyne Junction. The latter species differs most obviously in 1) the leaves ending
in a rounded 'capitate’ tip, 2) the receptacle being narrow-conical (not rounded), and 3) the pappus sheath
being split along one side.
Haptotrichion colwillii is named after John Colwill, a Western Australian horticulturalist who has
a particular interest in the native Asteraceae and who first collected this species.
The illustration is drawn from a plant raised from seed collected by Herbert Demarz and grown at Kings
Park Botanic Garden, Perth. I should like to thank the staff of Kings Park for their unstinted assistance
in my study of this and other annual species of the Rhodanthe complex.
Haptotrichion conicum (B. Turner) Paul G. Wilson, comb. nov.
Waitzia conica B. Turner, Sida 2:428(1966). Type: 11 miles west of Gascoyne Junction, 24 Aug. 1965,
B.L. Turner 5405 (holo: MEL 598263; iso: MEL 598265, PERTH).
[Waitzia podolepis auct. non (Gaud.) Benth.: F. Muell., Zeitschrift des allgem. österreich. Apotheker-
Vereines 34 (no.36):933-936 (1896); F. Muell., Pl. Indig. Sharks Bay 16(1883).]
Distribution. Between Carnarvon and Gascoyne Junction, Western Australia.
A description of this species was provided by Mueller (1883) based on a collection made by
J. Polak (or Pollack) in 1882 from the Gascoyne River region (MEL 1584941). Mueller assumed that
the plant he was describing was Waitzia podolepis (Gaudich.) Benth.: 'this plant represents evidently
the genuine species, illustrated by Gaudichaud’, even though Mueller had seen no authentic material
of that species. In 1896 Mueller again included the Pollack specimen under W. podolepis but without
comment. In 1905 Diels and Pritzel stated that the Pollack collection was not W. podolepis, however,
they did not give it a name.
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