Flora of New Zealand Series

toadflax

Much-branched perennial with stout rootstock or rhizome; stems many, to c. 60 cm tall, glabrous or sometimes puberulent. Lvs 2-5 cm × c. 1.5-(5) mm, linear, glabrous, glaucous; apex acute. Infl. dense and many-flowered. Bracts linear to lanceolate, glabrous or minutely puberulent, > pedicels. Calyx 3-5 mm long, deeply lobed; lobes ovate, acute. Corolla 25-35 mm long (including the narrow spur 10-15 mm long), yellow with broad orange patch on and around pouch; upper lip 15-20 mm long. Capsule 8-10 × 5-7 mm, ellipsoid. Seed 1.5-2 mm diam. (including broad wing), broad-ellipsoid to orbicular, black, minutely tuberculate.

N.: N. Auckland (Awanui), occasional in Auckland, East Cape (Te Araroa), Rotorua and Hastings areas, Manawatu, and Wellington area; S.: Canterbury and Otago.

Europe, W. Asia 1904

Roadsides, railways, and waste places such as old building sites and cemeteries, often abundant in rough grass and to c. 600 m in the MacKenzie Basin and near Mt Cook.

FL Nov-Mar.