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Electronic Flora of South Australia species Fact Sheet

Family: Gyrostemonaceae
Codonocarpus cotinifolius

Citation: F. Muell., Pl. Indig. Col. Vic. 1:200 (1862).

Synonymy: Gyrostemon cotinifolius Desf., Mém. Mus. Hist. Nat. Paris 8:116 (1822).

Common name: Native (or desert) poplar.

Description:
Shrubs or trees rarely more than 8 m tall, usually obconical in shape; leaf blades obovate or oblanceolate, rarely elliptic or almost orbicular in young plants, 20-50 x 8-40 mm, acute or obtuse, glaucous.

Male flowers on pedicels 1-4 mm long, 5-6 mm across at anthesis, with calyx scarcely lobed to almost circular; female flowers often borne on branches below the male flowers or below the terminal vegetative growth, with pedicels 10-20 mm long, with calyx shallowly lobed to almost circular, with 30 or more carpels each with a terminal stigma arranged around the top of the central axis.

Fruit 8-14 mm long, with individual follicles dehiscing towards the inside; seeds c.3.5 mm long, obovoid but somewhat laterally compressed, with an almost circular embryo, rugose with more or less developed transverse ridges from the centre, with an irregular cream aril.

image of FSA1_Codonocarpus_cot.jpg
Image source: fig. 101 in Jessop J.P. & Toelken H.R. (Ed.) 1986. Flora of South Australia (4th edn).

Published illustration: Cunningham et al. (1982) Plants of western New South Wales, p. 290.

Distribution:  Short-lived trees found in a wide range of habitats but usually in sandy soils and often common in disturbed areas especially after fires.

S.Aust.: NW, LE, NU, GT, EP, NL, MU.   All mainland States.

Conservation status: native

Flowering time: March — June.


SA Distribution Map based
on current data relating to
specimens held in the
State Herbarium of South Australia

Biology: No text

Author: Not yet available


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