Common Name: Shaggy Peas
Description: Shrubs, erect or ascending to ± prostrate; stems mostly pubescent with laterally attached, ± 2-branched hairs.
Leaves opposite or sometimes alternate, simple, margins entire or lobed, commonly pungent; upper surface reticulate, sometimes warty, margins flat or recurved; stipules rigid, recurved or spreading.
Inflorescences terminal or axillary racemes; clusters or corymbs, somtimes solitary; bracts 3-lobed, often caducous; bracteoles often caducous. Calyx 5-toothed, teeth ± equal, the upper two broader and united higher up. Petals clawed, standard ± circular, emarginate, longer than wings and keel; wings oblong or obovate; keel straight or slightly curved, broad and obtuse. Stamens free; anthers uniform. Ovary stipitate; ovules 2–4; style filiform or thickened towards base; stigma small, terminal.
Pods ovoid or oblong, valves leathery; seeds without an aril.
Distribution and occurrence: World: 3 spp., endemic Aust., Qld, N.S.W., Vic.
Molecular systematic work has shown that Podolobium scandens, P. procumbens and P. alpestre are more closely related to the genus Callistachys where they are now included. The three remaining species are closely related to Chorizema, but further study of this relationship is required.
Text by B. Wiecek, updated by R.L.Barrett, Aug. 2021
Taxon concept:
| | Key to the species | |
| Leaves entire, with or without a pungent apex. | Podolobium aciculiferum |
| 1 | Leaves lobed, the lobes pungent-pointed. | 3 |
| 2 | Margins of leaves deeply and irregularly lobed; leaves ovate to narrow-ovate in outline. | Podolobium ilicifolium |
| Margins of leaves with shallow, ± regular, sinuate lobes; leaves oblong to ovate in outline.
Back to | Podolobium aestivum |
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