Species profile—Pimelea leptospermoides
Classification
Plantae (plants) → Equisetopsida (land plants) → Thymelaeaceae → Pimelea leptospermoides
Sighting data
Species details
- Kingdom
- Plantae (plants)
- Class
- Equisetopsida (land plants)
- Family
- Thymelaeaceae
- Scientific name
- Pimelea leptospermoides F.Muell.
- WildNet taxon ID
- 12595
- Alternate name(s)
- serpentine rice flower
- Nature Conservation Act 1992 (NCA) status
- Near threatened
- Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (EPBC) status
- Vulnerable
- Conservation significant
- Yes
- Confidential
- No
- Endemicity
- Native
- Pest status
- Nil
- Description
- Pimelea leptospermoides is a shrub growing 0.3 to 1 m high. The young stems are hairy. The leaves are alternate, shortly petiolate, narrowly obovate to elliptic, sparsely appressed-hairy on both surfaces or only abaxially, olive or dark blue-green on adaxial surface, usually paler abaxially. The lamina is 7 to 22 mm long and 2 to 7 mm wide. The flowers are bisexual or male and occur in the upper axils, 1 to several per axil, densely antrorse-hairy outside and white in colour. The hypanthium is 6 to 10 mm long. The style-portion is poorly defined, 4.5 to 8 mm long, hairy inside. The sepals are 2 to 4 mm long. The stamens are inserted below the sepals and are subsessile in the throat. The anther locules are introrse.
Pimelea leptospermoides was included under Pimelea umbratica by Threlfall (1983) but can be readily distinguished by the lateral veins of the leaves, which are nearly parallel to the margin distally rather than acutely angled to the margin as in P. umbratica (Rye, 1990). - Map
- View Map
- Distribution
- Pimelea leptospermoides occurs in central eastern Queensland from near Marlborough to Rockhampton. Its extent of occurrence is 110 km, and within an area of 1000 sq km. It was recorded in SF 61, SF 114 (Lake Learmouth) and in Princhester Conservation Park (QDNR 2000).
- Distributional limits
- -22.7334271, 149.8232322
-23.2592557, 150.6927421 - Range derivation
- Range derived from extent of the taxon's verified records
- Habitat
- This species occurs on stony hillsides and in sandy clay soils, in open eucalypt forest (Rye 1990). It grows in serpentine soils which have high toxic levels of various metals, and a deficiency of the major general plant nutrients. It is found in most serpentine soil vegetation communities, but not in riverine forest on black clays, or dry rainforest on stony red and brown clay loams and clays. Eucalyptus fibrosa subsp. fibrosa and Corymbia xanthope are also indicators of serpentine soil within the species range, and the three species co-occur. The species occurs in tall open forest, open forest and low open forest, all with a grassy and/or heathy understorey, and in woodland with a Melaleuca bracteata subcanopy layer where prolonged flooding occurs (QDNR 2000).
- Reproduction
- The flowers are bisexual or male (Rye 1990) and borne throughout the year with a peak from May to Oct. The species regenerates after disturbance along roadsides, and after tree fall and fire (QDNR 2000).
- Status notes
- Pimelea leptospermoides is listed as Near Threatened under the Queensland Nature Conservation Act 1992 (Queensland) and Vulnerable under the Commonwealth Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999.
- Notes
- Occurs in the following Queensland pastoral districts: Port Curtis.
- References
- Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities (DSEWPC) (2012). Pimelea leptospermoides in Species Profile and Threats Database, Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities, Canberra. Accessed 29/05/2012. http://www.environment.gov.au/sprat.
Queensland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) (2000). Species Management Manual. Forest and Fauna Conservation and Ecology Section, Queensland Department of Natural Resources.
Queensland Herbarium (2011). Specimen label information. Queensland Herbarium. Accessed 21/07/2011.
Rye, B.L. in George, A.S. (Ed) (1990). Flora of Australia 18: 172.
Threlfall, S. (1983). The Genus Pimelea (Thymelaeaceae) in Eastern Mainland Australia. Brunonia 5 (2): 172. - Profile author
- Lynise Wearne (25/06/2012)
Other resources
- Species Profile and Threats Database (SPRAT)
- The Australasian Virtual Herbarium (AVH)
- Atlas of Living Australia
Data source
This profile data is sourced from the QLD Wildlife Data API using the Get species by ID function used under CC-By 4.0.
https://apps.des.qld.gov.au/species/?op=getspeciesbyid&taxonid=12595.
This information is sourced from the WildNet database managed by the Queensland Department of Environment and Science.
