The New Zealand Plant Conservation Network

Species

Gaimardia setacea

Etymology

Gaimardia: after Gaimard
setacea: bristly

Common Name(s)

Gaimardia

Threat Status

Non Threatened

Status 2004

Non Threatened

Authority

Gaimardia setacea Hook.f.

Family

Centrolepidaceae

Flora Category

Vascular - Native

Synonyms

None

Distribution

Indigenous. New Zealand: South and Stewart Islands. Also in New Guinea and Tasmania.

Habitat

In the South Island strictly montane to alpine., in bogs. On Stewart Island in similar sites but at lower altitudes as well as alpine.

Features

Compact, dark brown, occasionally glaucescent herb forming cushions up to 900 mm across. Roots fibrous. Stems 20–80 mm long, erect, wiry. Leaves 5–20 mm long, << 0.5 mm wide, distichous, very stiff erect to erecto-patent, glabrous, linear-setaceous, tapering to a long acicular tip; sheath almost = lamina in length, glabrous, lustrous, brown, produced at the tip into a ligule. Flowering stems > leaves, naked, terminated by 2–3 alternate glume-like, minutely papillate bracts; each bract enclosing 1 pseudanthium only, the third or uppermost bract sterile; hyaline scales 0. Male 2 in each pseudanthium. Female, 2 in each pseudanthium, styles not connate; occasionally with one ovary aborting. Fruit slightly > 0.5 mm. long, oblong-ovoid, surface faintly and irregularly reticulate

Similar Taxa

Distinguished from Centrolepis Labill. by have two male flowers per pseudanthium; two fused and collateral female flowers; two-three, distinctly alternate, glume-like floral bracts and opaque, light-brown leaf-sheaths.

Flowering

November – January

Fruiting

January – March

Propagation Technique

Difficult. Should not be removed from the wild.

Threats

Not Threatened

Endemic Taxon

No

Endemic Genus

No

Endemic Family

No

This page last updated on 10 Feb 2012