Flora of New Zealand Series

Arnica oporina Forst. f. Prodr. 1786, 56.

Type locality: Dusky Sound. Type: K, G. Forster.

Shrub up to 3 m. tall or more; branchlets, lvs below, and peduncles clad in soft white to slightly yellowish tomentum. Lvs 5-10 × 1·5-2 cm., narrow-oblanceolate to lanceolate, acuminate, narrowed to winged petiole, coriac., glab. above when mature, closely bluntly dentate, teeth calloused. Peduncles 3-8 cm. long, stout, clad in foliaceous bracts. Capitula 3-4 cm. diam.; phyll. in 2-3 series, linear-oblong, acute, outer tomentose on back, inner glab. or nearly so except at tips. Ray-florets white, disk-florets yellow, receptacle up to 1 cm. diam.; achenes compressed, pilose, 4-5 mm. long; pappus-hairs slender, up to 6 mm. long.

DIST.: S. Sounds of Fiordland from Martin's Bay southwards, on sheltered coasts.

FL. 1-? FT. 3-?

Var. robusta Kirk Stud. Fl. 1899, 265. Lvs shorter, more coriac., more deeply toothed; peduncles shorter, capitula smaller. Of uncertain status.

Hooker altered the spelling to operina, but as the Forsters were in Dusky Sound from March to May, the epithet oporina (autumnal) is appropriate.