Brachyscome longiscapa
Biostatus
Native
Category
Vascular
Structural class
Herbs - Dicotyledonous composites
Simplified description
A small, perennial rosette forming herb with petiolate, dark green leaves with entire or sparingly lobed margins. The white and yellow flowers are composite and daisy like.
Flower colours
White, Yellow
Detailed description
Perennial rosette forming herb. Leaves spathulate, or cuneately narrowed to a winged petiole, and ovate to obovate, mostly entire, between 12 mm and 60 mm (usually between 30 mm and 60 mm) long and between 3 mm and 15 mm (usually between 7 mm and 15 mm) wide, sometimes with 1–6 pairs of shallow lobes, glabrous but sometimes with few hairs on upper surface and with many stalked glandular hairs on lower surface and margin; leaf tips obtuse to subacute. Peduncles usually leafless, sometimes with 1 scale-like leaf, and usually sparsely to moderately clothed in glandular hairs at least near capitulum, but rarely glabrous, between 50mm and 200mm (usually between 120 mm and 200 mm) long, and between 0.5 mm and 1.2 mm in diameter at flowering, extending up to 300 mm long at fruiting. Involucral bracts lanceolate to elliptic-oblong and obtuse to acute and fimbriate at their apex, glandular hairy and between 3 mm and 6 mm (usually between 4 mm and 6 mm) long. Ray florets numerous and usually white, sometimes tinged pink on the reverse side, and are between 5 mm and 8 mm long. Disc florets greenish yellow. Achenes obovoid, compressed, eglandular, between 1.5 mm and 2 mm long, with a pappus of a few bristles, between 0.1 mm and 0.3 mm long. (Description adapted from Webb et al., 1988)
Similar taxa
The species is most similar to B. lucens which also has entire leaves, but B. lucens is only found on a few limestone hills in eastern Marlborough and is not sympatric with B. longiscapa. Brachyscome sinclairii can be similar looking and is sometimes sympatric with B. longiscapa. While entire-leaved specimens are sometimes found in B. sinclairii, and lobed-leaved specimens in B. longiscapa, B. longiscapa can usually be readily distinguished by its entire or sparingly toothed leaf form and by its long thin peduncles.
The species is also similar in appearance to some species of Lagenophora, but as most of these are not alpine species it is only likely to be sympatric with L. cuneata, which differs from B. longiscapa by having significantly smaller and shorter ray florets, and leaves that are notched rather than lobed.
Distribution
Endemic. New Zealand: South Island (Owen Range (Kahurangi National Park), then more common in inland South Canterbury and North Otago, extending as far south as northern Southland).
Habitat
Montane to high alpine. Mostly found in tussock grassland and on rock outcrops.
Substrate details
On substrates including greywacke, schist, marble, ultramafic rocks and others.
Current conservation status
The conservation status of all known New Zealand vascular plant taxa at the rank of species and below were reassessed in 2022-2023 using the New Zealand Threat Classification System (NZTCS) – more information about this can be found on the NZTCS website. This report includes replaces all previous NZTCS lists for vascular plants. Previous assessments can be found here.
Please note, threat classifications are often suggested by authors when publications fall between NZTCS assessment periods – these interim threat classification statuses has not been assessed by the NZTCS panel.
- Conservation status of vascular plants in Aotearoa New Zealand, 2023. 2024. Peter J. de Lange, Jane Gosden, Shannel P. Courtney, Alexander J. Fergus, John W. Barkla, Sarah M. Beadel, Paul D. Champion, Rowan Hindmarsh-Walls, Troy Makan and Pascale Michel Department of Conservation. Source: NZTCS and licensed by DOC for reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence.
2023 | At Risk – Naturally Uncommon | Qualifiers: Sp, DPS, DPT
Detailed taxonomy
Family
Asteraceae
Taxonomic notes
Some plants resembling B. longiscapa from Otago and Southland have entire leaves but much shorter peduncles than typical of B. longiscapa, and it is unclear where these entities sit in relation to existing species. Some regard them as variants of B. sinclairii and others lump them in with B. longiscapa.
Endemic taxon
Yes
Endemic genus
No
Endemic family
No
Ecology
Flowering
Ocober–April (Webb et al., 1988)
Life cycle and dispersal
Pappate cypselae are dispersed by wind (Thorsen et al., 2009).
Other information
Etymology
brachyscome: From Greek brachys ‘short’ and comus ‘hair’, refers to the lack of papys on the fruit
NVS code
The National Vegetation Survey (NVS) Databank is a physical archive and electronic databank containing records of over 94,000 vegetation survey plots - including data from over 19,000 permanent plots. NVS maintains a standard set of species code abbreviations that correspond to standard scientific plant names from the Ngä Tipu o Aotearoa - New Zealand Plants database.
BRALON
Chromosome number
2n = 18
Previous conservation statuses
2017 | At Risk – Naturally Uncommon | Qualifiers: DP, Sp
2012 | Data Deficient
2009 | Not Threatened
2004 | Not Threatened
Referencing and citations
References and further reading
Simpson G, Thomson JS. 1943. Notes on Some New Zealand Plants and Descriptions of New Species. Transactions and Proceedings of the Royal Society of New Zealand 73: 155–171. https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/TPRSNZ1943-73.2.12.14.
Thorsen MJ, Dickinson KJM, Seddon PJ. 2009. Seed dispersal systems in the New Zealand flora. Perspectives in Plant Ecology, Evolution and Systematics 11: 285–309. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ppees.2009.06.001.
Webb CJ, Sykes WR, Garnock-Jones PJ. 1988. Flora of New Zealand, Volume IV. Naturalised Pteridophytes, Gymnosperms, Dicotyledons. Botany Division, Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, Christchurch, NZ. 1365 p.
Attribution
Page updated by Rowan Hindmarsh-Walls (29 May 2022)