Flora of New Zealand Series

Veronica glaucophylla Ckn. in T.N.Z.I. 31, 1899, 422.

Type locality: Craigieburn Mountains, at an altitude of 1200 m. Type: A, 7970, L. Cockayne No. 8037, Jan. 11, 1902; a cultivated plant, No. 8037 is represented in both A and CM with Cockayne's label "Type specimen".

Bushy shrub to 1 m. tall. Branchlets rather slender, very finely, us. bifariously, pubescent, length of internodes several × diam., older stems rather smooth and grey. Lvs patent, 13-16 × 5-6 mm., lanceolate, glaucous, drying darkish brown but not black, stomata ∞ on both surfaces; lf-bud without sinus; lamina narrowed gradually to subacute to acute tip, entire, glab. except for microscopic pubescence on ± bevelled margin. Infls lateral, simple, 2-3 × lf-length; peduncle short, finely pubescent. Bracts < 1 mm. long, ciliolate, < pedicels. Calyx-lobes 1-1·5 mm. long, broad, obtuse, ciliolate on pale membr. border. Corolla white, tube barely = calyx, hairy in the throat, lobes > tube, c. 2.5 mm. long, rounded, spreading. Style and ovary with fine sparse pubescence. Capsule to 5 × 4 mm., narrowly to broadly ovate, subacute, pubescent, > 2 × calyx.

DIST.: S. South Marlborough to mid-Canterbury. Shrubby banks and gullies in tussock-grassland.

FL. 1-2-(3).

V. traversii var. fallax Cheesem. Man. N.Z. Fl. 1906, 519. The only sheet seen so labelled by Cheeseman is A 7978, St. James Station, Clarence River, 3000 ft, T. Kirk n. 775, 1577 to Kew. Of the two specimens the smaller, in early fl., has infls c. 3 cm. long, and the very short corolla-tube and pubescent ovary of H. glaucophylla; the larger, which more nearly matches the brief varietal diagnosis, has infls to 7 cm. long, the corollas mostly fallen but the remaining ones with the tube definitely > calyx and ovary almost to quite glab. Both resemble H. glaucophylla in having lf-bud without sinus. Cheeseman's 1577 at Kew is quoted by Summerhayes under H. brachysiphon. H. glaucophylla and H. brachysiphon grow together in the vicinity of St. James Station.