Flora of New Zealand Series

Type locality: Dunstan Gorge on the Clutha River, Otago. Type: K, Hector and Buchanan. A Buchanan specimen from Cromwell, Otago in CM ex Herb. Cheeseman is probably an isotype.

Stock stout and branched with one or several rosettes. Lvs ∞, very narrow-spathulate, c. 3 cm. × 3 mm., tip subacute, petiole ill-defined, broad part of lamina only c. 5 mm. long; hairs alike on both surfaces and all over plant, uniformly stiff, straight, closely appressed, strongly overlapping to hide epidermis completely. Lateral branches us. few, erect, up to 15 cm. long, internodes = or > lvs. Stem-lvs few, upper ones sessile, narrow-oblong, c. 6 × 2 mm., tip subacute. Cymes ebracteate, us. simple and terminal, occ. forked above uppermost If; internodes between frs > calyx; pedicels very short. Calyx c. 3 mm. long, lobes > 1/2 length, very narrow, acute; hairs as on rest of plant but sts more spreading. Corolla yellow, c. 5 mm. diam., tube 4-5 mm. long, widest at top, lobes 2.5 × 1·5 mm., ± oblong; filaments very short, anther-tips below to just above scales; style much > calyx in fr., stigma capitate. Nutlets ovate, pointed and ± keeled, c. 1·7 mm. long.

DIST.: S. Central Otago, dry rocks near Clutha and Kawarau Rivers.

Recorded by Petrie in an undated note (W 4742) as "now almost extinct". The latest collecting date seen is "Sept. and Oct. 1891, R. A. Barrett, Cromwell". A heavy stock without fls collected by A. Wall at Leaning Rock above Cromwell (W 2386) has crowded short lvs with the indumentum of M. albo-sericea.