Flora of New Zealand Series

Erect or ascending, much-branched shrub, up to c. 30 cm tall; branchlets obscured by persistent, imbricate, appressed lvs and tomentum, 2-4 mm diam. (including lvs). Lvs glabrous on lower, outer surface, densely white-tomentose on upper, inner surface, apetiolate, ovate to oblong-triangular, involute, obtuse to acute or acuminate, cucullate, (2)-2.5-4 × 1-2 mm. Lvs of seedlings and reversion shoots spreading, densely tomentose on both surfaces or only on upper. Capitula 3-7 mm diam., solitary, sessile. Middle involucral bracts usually glabrous, sometimes hairy on lamina, oblong, obtuse to acute, not or slightly radiating, membranous, with pale and usually translucent, rarely whitish lamina, and opaque stereome, 3-4-(6) mm long. Disc pale or bright yellow. Achenes with short appressed hairs, cylindric, slightly angled or compressed, c. 1 mm long.

S.: montane to alpine throughout, descending to lower altitudes on the Kaikoura Coast and Otago Peninsula.

Endemic.

Mostly rocky places and cliffs, also in grassland and herbfield.

This entity was treated as H. selago (Hook. f.) Benth. et Hook. f. ex Kirk by Allan (1961) who accepted 4 vars. The type of H. selago represents a hybrid between H. coralloides and H. parvifolium [Molloy, B. P. J., in Eagle, A., Eagle's Trees and Shrubs of New Zealand, Second Series (1982)]; the earliest available name for this sp. is H. intermedium. Most material can be referred to var. selago sensu Allan; other vars are local and are distinguished as follows: var. intermedium by the narrow, flexible branches and small lvs (mountains W. of Lake Wakatipu); var. acutum Cheeseman by the acute to acuminate rather than obtuse to acute lf apex (N. Canterbury and Clarence Valley); var. tumidum Cheeseman by the stouter branchlets, 3-4 mm rather than 2-3 mm diam. (Otago Peninsula). Plants in the Chalk Range, Benmore area of S. Marlborough are distinguished by the bright rather than pale yellow capitula.