Common name: Trailing African Daisy
Osteospermum spinescens Thunb. APNI* Description: Shrub, 50–100 cm tall; stem divaricately branched; branches ridgid, more or less viscid, densely leafy, becoming spiny.
Leaves coriaceous, linear-oblanceolate to clavate, 5–20 mm long, 1–5 mm wide, cuneate, entire or distally 2- or 3-toothed or pinnatifid-pinnatipartite; both surfaces hairy, becoming glabrous, glaucous.
Flower heads solitary, terminal, 10–20 mm diam.; peduncle rigid, 5–15 mm long, becoming spinose after fruiting; involucral bracts usually 8 in one row, 5–8 mm long, margins and apices often stipitate-glandular. Ray florets as many as involucral bracts; ligules yellow to orange, 4–8 mm long. Disc florets yellow to orange 3–4 mm long.
Achenes glabrous, 3-winged, 8–10 mm long, not beaked.
Flowering: Flowers and fruits September to February.
Distribution and occurrence: Naturalised near Griffith, NSW. In waste and disturbed sites along roadsides near cultvated fields.
NSW subdivisions: *SWP
Text by Louisa Murray
Taxon concept: Flora of Australia Vol 37, p 329 (2015)
APNI* Provides a link to the Australian Plant Name Index (hosted by the Australian National Botanic Gardens) for comprehensive bibliographic data
***The AVH map option provides a detailed interactive Australia wide distribution map drawn from collections held by all major Australian herbaria participating in the Australian Virtual Herbarium project.
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