Flora of New Zealand Series

shrubby stonecrop

Glabrous, much-branched subshrub with widespreading or sprawling, often twisted or curved, stems to c. 50 cm long and 1 cm diam. Lvs alternate, sessile, mainly aggregated and often imbricate towards shoot apices but not in terminal rosettes, mostly 2.5-6 × 1-2 cm and 3-5 mm thick, oblanceolate, obovate, narrowly ellipsoid-obovoid, or ellipsoid-spathulate, convex or flattened above and below, shining green; margins entire, often reddish, especially towards the obtuse, subacute or rounded apex. Infl. a terminal ± pyramidal panicle with a number of long, erect to spreading branches, usually 6-15 cm high and 5- c. 14 cm across, with lower bracts leaflike. Fls rather numerous, subsessile or with pedicels to 2 mm long, secund. Sepals equal, 2-3 mm long, triangular-ovate. Petals 5, patent, 6.5-8.5 × c. 2 mm, narrowly triangular, yellow, acute. Stamens 3-5 mm long, yellow. Carpels and styles yellow or greenish yellow. Scales ± rectangular, wider than long. Follicles yellowish, ± parallel. Mature seed not seen.

N.: Auckland, Palmerston North and Bunnythorpe (Manawatu), Wellington; S.: Nelson City, Kaikoura coast (Marlborough), coastal Canterbury, especially Port Hills and other parts of Banks Peninsula, Dunedin and Otago Peninsula.

Mexico 1959

Coastal cliffs, banks and walls, sometimes in waste places, scrub, or understorey of plantations and shrubberies, sometimes forming dense stands.

FL Jul-May.

S. praealtum is the largest and commonest of the shrubby sedums wild or cultivated in N.Z. (Plate 12). Our plants belong to subsp. praealtum.