Flora of New Zealand Series

Glabrous, perennial herb, forming loose mats; stems numerous, freely rooting at base, decumbent with ± erect apical parts to c. 10 cm high. Lvs alternate, sessile, crowded and imbricate along upturned part of sterile shoots and not concentrated near apex or forming rosettes, c. 7-17 × 1.5-2.5 mm and 1-1.5 mm thick, subcylindric and subterete with upper and lower surfaces convex and no obvious margins, ± glaucous, occasionally deep green; apex sharply acute or mucronulate. Infl. terminal, usually 15-30 cm high, with numerous leaflike bracts along main rachis, often > vegetative lvs, corymbose, usually 2.5-5 cm across, dense, with 3-5 forked branches. Fls numerous, with pedicels to 2 mm long, ± secund. Sepals slightly unequal, 2-3 mm long, triangular-ovate or oblong-ovate. Petals usually 5, ± patent, 5-6 × 1.7-2 mm, elliptic, narrowly or lanceolate-elliptic, yellow, ± obtuse. Stamens 4.5-6 mm long; filaments yellow; anthers yellowish. Carpels and styles greenish yellow. Scales ± rectangular (wider than long) to square. Follicles yellow, ± parallel. Seed c. 0.8-1 mm long, ± ellipsoid, longitudinally ribbed; ribs ± papillate.

N.: Mt Albert (Auckland), Wellington; S.: Banks Peninsula and Oamaru (Canterbury), Otago Peninsula, C. Otago.

Europe 1959

Coastal cliffs, banks and inland rocky slopes, usually in the vicinity of settlements, roadsides, embankments, waste places, especially in dry and open gravel and shingly soils.

FL Dec-Mar.

S. reflexum is a commonly cultivated sp. especially in cooler areas. It has not been distinguished from S. forsteranum in N.Z. before, and both spp. belong to series Rupestre Berger of sect. Sedum which is one of the most confused taxonomically in the genus (see Hensen, K. J. W. and Groendijk-Wilders, N., Plantsman 8: 1-20 (1986)). All members of sect. Sedum whether wild or cultivated in N.Z. have the infl. drooping in bud. Typical wild South Id S. reflexum has erect sterile shoots with the lvs crowded along their length and not confined in a terminal tuft, and the lvs are glaucous, narrow, and subterete with rounded surfaces (broadly elliptic in transverse section). Generally, S. reflexum seems to be a larger and more erect plant than S. forsteranum but this character is of very limited value unless the 2 spp. are growing together.