Flora of New Zealand Series

Branches us. several, close-set, ± 4 cm. long. Lvs ± 6-10 × 4 mm. (rarely up to 20 × 6 mm.), very densely imbricate, erect, then patent, very coriac., costa more evident. Bracts ± 6-8 mm. long, linear. Peduncles ± 4-6 cm. long, 1-2-fld. Fls up to 15 mm. long; calyx-lobes ovate-oblong.

DIST.: N. Mount Egmont (type locality), Mount Ruapehu, Mount Tongariro.

Colenso's F. major (T.N.Z.I. 31, 1899, 272) from "Ruahine Mountain-range, east side; 1898: Mr. H. Hill" appears to belong here, but I have not seen authentic specimens.

Colenso (T.N.Z.I. 20, 1888, 196) described his F. truncatella from specimens collected on "Banks of a small mountain stream on the west side of Mount Ngauruhoe; 'altitude 5,200 feet'; County of East Taupo; 1887: Mr. H. Hill." "Leaves light-green, close-set, imbricating, sessile, semi-amplexicaul, 3 lines, long, obovate-oblong . . . bracts [with] tips ciliate. Calyx large, 4-5 lines long, 6-lobed; lobes oblong, suddenly acuminate, tips truncate . . . margins glandularciliate. Corolla 1/2 inch diameter . . . much veined . . . lamina 6-lobed, cut nearly to base; lobes oblong somewhat broader near apex, spreading, the upper half white, the lower reddish; tips . . . tuberculate-ciliate." Colenso emphasizes "its larger membranaceous flowers with glandular and tuberculate-ciliate margins to both corolla and calyx, which are also much veined, and in the tips of the calycine lobes, and of the bracts, being much truncate."