Flora of New Zealand Series

Type locality: Snug Cove, Doubtful Sound. Type: BD 55332, H. H. Allan, 17/2/46.

Stouter plant with stems up to 1 m. tall, 1 cm. diam. at base; stems and branches sulcate, nearly glab. Lower and mid lvs up to 15 × 5 cm., broadly ovate in outline; terminal lobe acute to subacute, subtriangular, coarsely dentate-apiculate; lobulate in lower portion; lateral lobes confluent, up to 4 cm. long, again lobulate-apiculate; petiole 3-5 cm. long, with narrowly winged, distantly dentate margins, with or without small lobes, with lobulate auricles at base. Uppermost lvs linear, 8-3 cm. long, merging into filiform bracts of infl. Infl. laxly corymbose. Capitula few to ∞, c. 9 mm. long; phyll. ± 12, 6-7 mm. long, linear-oblong, subacute, margins narrowly scarious. Florets 10-25; achenes c. 3 mm. long, grooved, glab., narrowed to very short beak. Pappus-hairs c. 6 mm. long.

DIST.: S., St. Coastal to lowland streamsides, forest margins and open places: Waimangaroa, in pakihis, P. G. Morgan; Routeburn, D. Petrie; Weheka, near Fox Glacier, H. H. Allan; western fiords, common.

HYBRIDISM

Hybridism certainly appears to play a part in the polymorphy exhibited in the genus in N.Z., but there has been no detailed study. Cockayne and Allan (Ann. Bot., Lond. 48, 1934, 47-48) mainly on herbarium evidence have suggested the hybrid groups: E. arguta × quadridentata and E. minima × wairauensis. A specimen in W collected by Petrie "Upper Hawea" and labelled E. glabrescens has the achenes of E. wairauensis and lvs suggesting the crossing of var. robusta with E. scaberula both in shape and indumentum. A specimen in BD collected by R. Mason near Mount Lodestone, Nelson, similarly suggests the crossing of E. wairauensis with scaberula.

Belcher (loc. cit. 70) remarks: "Senecio glomeratus and S. hispidulus appear to hybridize so freely over much or all of their largely overlapping range that determination of material in this complex is exceedingly difficult." He considers E. arguta var. α Hook. f. Fl. N. Z. 1, 1853, 142 as probably a hybrid with scaberula as the other parent. He also records S. hispidulus × quadridentatus and (p. 73) says: "I have not cited specimens of hybrid nature, except those indicated above, for lack of space. They are, however, quite common in all the herbaria examined."