Olearia microphylla

Location & distribution maps

Common name:         ...

Conservation status: ...

Etymology:   

• Is named after Johann Gottfried Olearius, a 17th-century German scholar and author of Specimen Florae Hallensis

• The specific epithet (microphylla) means "small-leaved"

Flowers

• The heads or daisy-like "flowers" are arranged singly on the ends of side branches and are 9–17 mm (0.35–0.67 in) in diameter and sessile

• Each head has six to eight white ray florets surrounding four to eight yellow disc florets

• Flowering occurs from June to October 

Fruit:                            

• A glandular achene, the pappus with 32 to 47 bristles

Leaves:         

• Its leaves are spatula-shaped, 2–7 mm long and 1–3 mm wide and more or less sessile, the upper surface pimply, the lower surface covered with greyish, woolly hairs and the edges rolled under

Stem & branches: 

Roots:         

Habit:        

• A shrub that typically grows to a height of up to 2 m 

Habitat:   

• Shrubland, heath and sclerophyll forest, where it is associated with such species as Eucalyptus sieberi and Eucalyptus sclerophylla

Distribution:                  

• Widespread from south-eastern Queensland through eastern NSW and the Australian Capital Territory and as far south as the Queanbeyan district

Additional notes:     

• Taxonomy

  • Snow bush was first formally described in 1804 by Étienne Pierre Ventenat who gave it the name Aster microphyllus in his book Jardin de la Malmaison.

  • In 1916, Joseph Maiden and Ernst Betche changed the name to Olearia microphylla in A Census of New South Wales Plants

Sources of information:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olearia_microphylla (2024)