Flora of New Zealand Series

Original localities: Buchenau cited a number of localities and collectors, all from Australia; WELT 11207, Geographe Bai, West Australia, Mrs Irvine, was labelled in Buchenau's hand.

Clumps densely or loosely tufted, dark-coloured. Rhizome 5–8 mm. diam., horizontal, not much branched. Flowering stems 30–100–(120) cm. × 1.5–3 mm., rather distant along the rhizome, rigid, terete, light to dark yellow-brown, pith continuous; basal bracts stiff, acute, red-brown, upper ones larger, broad and mucronate. Lvs 1–2, terete, bright green, sheathing at the base, similar to the stems but shorter. Infl. apparently lateral, open, irregularly-branched, branchlets ∞, rigid, almost equalling the pungent subtending bract. Fls c. 3 mm. long, clustered at the tips of the branchlets; tepals very stiff, red-brown with green to light brown midrib. Stamens us. 3 perfect and 3 aborted, but occ. 1 or more of the us. aborted inner ring are complete; anthers twice as long as filaments. Capsule slightly > tepals, ovoid, shining, mucronate, dark brown, almost black.

DIST.: N. Throughout. S. As far south as Okarito on the west and Timaru on the east, but also at Dunedin. Ch.

In brackish water and coastal sandy soil. Inland in North Id at Lake Rotorua, and on the Waikato R. near Orakeikorako, and in South Id at Mesopotamia, Rangitata R.

Var. maritimus which has a wide distribution in the North Temperate Zone, is generally a lighter coloured plant, with larger and less densely aggregated lighter fls, with 6 stamens, and larger capsules with seeds distinctly tailed.

Healy in T.R.S.N.Z. 72, 1943, 326 notes "the forms present on the coast between the mouth of the Waipara River and Amberley Beach differ from the normal in that the inflorescences are more compacted".