Flora of New Zealand Series

Type locality: "East Coast" (probably near Clive). Type: K, 942 Colenso, 1849.

Bushy spring- and summer-lfy shrub up to 2 m. tall; branches spreading; branchlets drooping, flanged, much-compressed, striate to grooved, ± pilose, up to 20 cm. × 2 mm. Lvs 5-7-foliolate; lflts subsessile, obcordate to obovate, 3 × 2 mm., ± pilose. Infl. of simple, ascending to erect, 5-10-(15)-fld racemes on ± pubescent peduncles ± 10 mm. long. Fls 3-4 × 3 mm. on pubescent pedicels c. 1 mm. long. Calyx ± 1 × 1 mm., ciliate; teeth minute, broad-triangular. Standard, keel and wings all white, purple-veined, auricles rounded. Ovary glab. or nearly so. Pods stramineous, c. 7 × 4 mm., broad-ovate to suborbicular, ± compressed; beak rather stout, straight, subulate, almost pungent, 2-3 mm. long. Seeds 1-2, c. 3 × 2 mm., somewhat flattened, pale brown to straw-coloured, us. with dark blotch.

DIST.: N. Lowland to montane streamsides and forest margins from lat. 38° 30' southwards.

In type cover at K are five sheets, all with Colenso specimens. The type consists of two fruiting pieces; pods stramineous, compressed, somewhat obliquely ovate-oblong, 6-7 × 3 mm.: beak rather stout, almost pungent, c. 3 mm. long.