Flora of New Zealand Series

Umbels simple, few-fld, on slender peduncles; involucral bracts few, minute; calyx-teeth small, petals white. Fr. globose to cylindric, sts ± laterally compressed. Mericarps with 3-6 ribs; dorsal thin, lateral rather thick. Vittae 3-8, between ribs. Small glab. creeping herbs rooting at nodes. "Phyllodes" us. clustered at nodes, sheathing at base; produced above into a cylindric or spathulate, fistular, septate axis. Genus of some 15 spp. of N. and S. America, Australia, Tasmania. The 3 known N.Z. spp. are endemic.

The N.Z. spp. have previously (e.g. by Cheeseman Man. N.Z. Fl. 1925, 656) been included under Crantzia lineata Nutt. The name Crantzia is now restricted to Crantzia Swartz, a member of the Buxaceae. The exact morphology of the vegetative organs is still not definitely determined. The treatment of the N.Z. spp. by Hill (J. Linn. Soc. (Bot.) 47, 1927, 525-551; Kew Bull. 1928, 267) is followed here, but much work on our forms remains to be done.