Flora of New Zealand Series

P. hamiltoni Kirk in T.N.Z.I. 11, 1879, 465.

P. masonae Cheesem. in T.N.Z.I. 53, 1921, 424.

Type locality: "In monte Kelly's Hill ad flumen Otira in alpibus ins. australis Novae-Zealandiae". Type: Lund (?). Portions of type gathering at K and W.

Primary root short-lived. Stem short and broadly napiform, us. simple, with cop. long hairs. Rosette us. flat, 1-10 cm. diam.; lvs of firm texture, punctate, often black-blotched; lamina linear to broad-lanceolate, us. gradually (more abruptly in some coastal plants) narrowed into flat petiole; tip obtuse, margin entire in seedling, us. but not always becoming toothed to strongly pinnate-dentate in flowering stage; lf-hairs few or ∞, best developed on raised transverse ridges opp. bases of teeth, undersurface glab. Infls mostly hidden by long stem-hairs, each spike reduced to a single floret; scape extremely short at flowering, up to 2.5 cm. long at fruiting, almost glab. except for tuft of hairs immediately below bract. Bract and sepals < 1 mm. long, always much < basal portion of capsule, membr. and without keel, glab. Corolla-tube long (up to 2.5 mm.), lobes often only 3, erect, narrow, us. < 1·5 mm. long; stamens 3 or 4 (in same plant); anthers to 1 mm. long; ovules ∞; capsule to 3 mm. long, seeds 10-50, irregularly angular.

DIST.: N., S., St. Boggy areas in tussock-grassland from Kaingaroa plains southwards, not known from Tararua Range or Mt. Egmont; also near sea-coasts of South Taranaki, Cape Palliser, and higher rainfall areas of S.

FL. 12-3. FT. 1-4.

Pilger (Pflanzenr. 102, 1937, 123) mentions male, female and hermaphrodite fls on the same rosette, but polygamy does not seem to have been studied locally.

P. hamiltoni Kirk was "distinguished by the ovate, obtuse, sepals, prominent midrib, the flowers on abbreviated scapes which elongate as the capsule approaches maturity, and especially by the capsule, which is the largest in the genus." In Herb. T. Kirk at W the only specimen collected by Hamilton at the type locality, Greymouth (labelled P. uniflora), definitely belongs to P. triandra, as does also a Petrie specimen from Tomahawk Lagoon, Dunedin, labelled P. hamiltoni. Cockayne (Veg. N.Z. ed. 2, 1928, 71, 87, 100, 101) used the name P. hamiltoni for flat rosettes of coastal moor.

P. masonae Cheesem. from Manaia, Taranaki, was said to differ from P. triandra in "the more robust habit, very fleshy and proportionately much broader leaves with obtuse callous tips, more minute sessile flowers the peduncles of which apparently do not lengthen in fruit, in the stamens being always 4, and in the smaller capsules". Size, texture and shape of lvs change with age of plant, habitat and season; fls of specimens from the original gathering and of others from the type locality fall easily within the size range of P. triandra; peduncles elongate irregularly in P. triandra, and both sessile and pedunculate capsules occur on one plant; trimerous and tetramerous fls are found frequently in both coastal and montane plants; capsule-length ranges in P. triandra from 1·5 to 3 mm. depending on vigour of plant.