We value your privacy

We use cookies and other technologies to enhance your experience, analyse site usage, help with reporting, and assist in other ways to improve the website. You can choose to allow cookies and other technologies or decline. Your choice will not affect site functionality.

Volume IV (1988) - Flora of New Zealand Naturalised Pteridophytes, Gymnosperms, Dicotyledons
Copy a link to this page Cite this record

Polygala myrtifolia L.

*P. myrtifolia L., Sp. Pl.  703  (1753)

sweet pea shrub

Perennial much-branched shrub up to 2 m high. Young stems with short curly hairs, glabrous when older. Lvs all alternate, glabrous or very sparsely hairy, elliptic to obovate, obtuse or rarely slightly retuse, entire, (10)-15-30-(35) mm long; petioles 1-2 mm long. Fls clustered in short, simple, terminal racemes; perianth coloured or veined purple toward apex; pedicels 5-8 mm long; bracts suborbicular, 2-3 mm long, persistent; 3 outer sepals ovate, 5-7 mm long; wings petaloid, ovate-orbicular, c. 15-17 mm long, slightly > corolla; outer petals 2-lobed, c. ?-1/4 length of keel; keel with a fimbriate crest near apex. Capsule glabrous, c. 10 mm long with a marginal wing c. 1 mm wide, c. ⅔ length of persistent calyx wings; seeds hairy, dark brown, oblong, c. 5 mm long; strophiole 3-lobed.

N.: common from Auckland City northwards, also established in Tauranga, New Plymouth, Napier, and on the W. coast N. of Wellington; S.: Nelson City.

South Africa 1870

Mostly in coastal habitats, occasionally in scrubland.

FL Jan-Dec.

Sweet pea shrub is cultivated in N.Z. as an ornamental.

Click to go back to the top of the page
Top