 Habit, Bluff knoll Rd, Stirling Ran., WA. Photo © I.Holliday |
 Young growth. Photo © W.R.Barker |
 Leaves and young inflorescences. Photo © W.R.Barker |
 Close-up of buds showing raised hairs. Photo © W.R.Barker |
 Leaves, inflorescences and closed fruits. Photo © W.R.Barker |
 Illustration of H. baxteri from Hooker's Icones Plantarum t. 440 (1842). Note shape of opened fruit cf. H. brownii . |
Synonymy
Hakea baxteri R.Br., Suppl. Prodr. Fl. Nov. Holl. 28 (1830)
T: King George Sound, Western Australia, 1829, W.Baxter s.n.; syn: BM, K.
Hakea salisburioides Hort. ex Meisn., in A.L.P.P. de Candolle, Prodr. 14: 409 (1856), as H. salisburyoides, pro. syn. under H. baxteri. T: not designated
Description
Erect shrub, 1–5 m tall, non-lignotuberous. Branchlets and young leaves densely appressed-ferruginous, glabrescent by flowering. Leaves flabelliform with deeply concave margins, 4–8 cm long, 3–9 cm wide, narrowly cuneate, entire; apex broadly rounded, spinose.
Inflorescence umbelliform with 4–8 flowers; rachis obscure; pedicels 3–4 mm long, densely ferruginous, with hairs raised, not sericeous, continuing onto perianth. Perianth 7–9 mm long. Pistil 7.5–10 mm long; gland U-shaped.
Fruit obliquely ovate or obovate, 3–4.5 cm long, 2–3.5 cm wide, rugose-reticulate. Seed obliquely elliptic or obovate, 20–30 mm long; wing broadly down one side of seed body, narrowly down other.
Distribution and ecology
Occurs in south-western Western Australia between the Stirling Ra., Albany and Bremer Bay, in heath scrub on rocky quartzitic slopes.
To plot an up to date distribution map based on herbarium collections for this species see Australia's Virtual Herbarium. Localities outside the native range may represent cultivated or naturalised records.
Flowering time
Flowers Oct.–Nov.
Derivation of name
Named after William Baxter (?-1836) who collected on the southern coast of
Relationships
Part of Section Hakea of Bentham (as Euhakea) and characterised by a non-conical pollen presenter, leaves without obvious venation, perianths with or without hairs and fruits with or without horns. Barker et al. (1999) recognised a number of informal morphological groups within the section.
Within this section 6 species were assigned to the informal Ceratophylla group by Barker et al. (1999). The group is close to the Obliqua group, sharing the morphological characteristics of few-flowered inflorescences with pubescent flowers on an obscure rachis, oblique pollen presenters and distinctly woody fruits without horns and usually without beaks and seed in which the wing encircles the seed body or is broadly down one side; the groups differ in the flat leaves of this group compared with the terete leaves of the Obliqua group.
Members of the group are H. baxteri, H. brownii, H. ceratophylla, H. flabellifolia, H. hookeriana and H. pandanicarpa, all from south-west WA.
Notes
A poorly collected species distinguishable from its sister species, H. brownii , by its larger flowers with woolly non-appressed indumentum, different wood structure in the fruit with a very broad red-brown wood zone basally, the seed wing very narrow on only one side of the seed body, the lack of a lignotuber, its habit (erect shrub) and locality.
Salisburiae adiantifolia Sm. is a later name for Gingko biloba L., and the name Hakea salisburioides was presumably used in horticultural circles because of the resemblance of the leaves of Hakea baxteri to those of Gingko.
Representative specimens
W.A.: 32 km E of Cranbrook, Chester Pass Rd, A.S.George 403 (PERTH); Red Gum Pass, A.Morrison s.n. (PERTH); Stirling Ra., upper W part of Modurup Peak, A.Strid 21541 (PERTH).
Weblinks
Link to FloraBase treatment of this species for WA.
Further illustrations
I. Holliday, Hakeas. A Field and Garden Guide 24-25 (2005)
J.A..Young, Hakeas of Western Australia. A Field and Identification Guide 15 (2006)