Flora of New Zealand Series

Veronica hectori Hook. f. Handbk N.Z. Fl. 1864, 212.

Type locality: Mt. Alta. Type: K, No. 27 Hector, 1863.

Small, erect, rather rigid shrub 10-75 cm. tall; stems and branches stout, sts decumbent and rooting at base, ascending, closely or rather sparsely branched. Ultimate branchlets erect, 3-10 cm. long, (2)-2.5-3·5 mm. diam., terete or weakly tetragonous at tips, rather hard and rigid, often glossy; internodes 1-2 mm. long, hidden or only very slightly exposed; nodal joint well-marked. Lvs 2-2*5 mm. long, connate for 1/4 to 1/2 length, broadly ovate-deltoid, thick, rounded on back, tip obtuse to subacute, convexly incurved and ± spreading, sts smoothly appressed and broadly obtuse with abrupt, small, blunt mucro. Spikes 1-1·5 cm. long, up to c. 15-fld. Bracts c. 2.5 mm. long, broadly ovate, obtuse to acute or mucronate, weakly ribbed. Calyx 2.5-3·5 mm. long, anterior lobes ovate-oblong, obtuse or subacute, weakly ribbed, free ⅓ to ⅔ length. Corolla-tube = or > calyx. Capsule 2.5-4 × 2-3 mm., oval to oblong, obtuse or subacute, > calyx.

DIST.: S. Wet subalpine scrub and tussock on mountains of South Canterbury and Otago, abundant in Fiordland and western Otago.

A polymorphic sp., the shape of the lf especially variable. Plants with smoothly appressed, hardly convex, obtuse lvs tipped with a small blunt mucro, such as occur particularly in N.E. Otago and near Lake Wakatipu, appear very different from those with the lvs subacute, thickly convex and ± incurved at tip and somewhat projecting, but it is difficult to make a satisfactory subdivision. The name H. subulata Simpson must be considered in relation to the more distinctly mucronate-lvd forms (see INCERTAE SEDIS).