Kunzea linearis

Features

Erect shrubs or small trees up to 12 m. Trunk 1–4), mostly erect, 0.10–0.60 m d.b.h. Bark dark brown to brown, ± elongate, coarsely tessellated usually firmly attached, though peeling inwards leaving centrally attached lunate flakes. Branches numerous; ascending to upright, plumose; branchlets plumose, slender; branchlets sericeous, indumentum copious, hairs antrorse-appressed, weakly flexuose, up to 0.68 mm long. Leaves sessile, hairy, rarely glabrous, densely crowded along branchlets toward apices; lamina 9.3–19.5 × 0.3–1.2 mm, initially silvery-grey (due to dense hair covering), maturing dark green to glaucous green above (as hairs are shed); linear, apex sharply acute, cuspidate, base attenuate; lamina margins copiously covered in silvery-grey hairs, these forming a thick band and fusing with the abaxial midrib hairs just short of lamina apex, and along decurrent leaf bases. Inflorescence spiciform 3–12-flowered botrya 20–80 mm long or an elongated, spiciform, 10–40-flowered botryum up to 180 mm long. Flowers of smaller botrya crowded, those of elongated botrya regularly spaced up to 20 mm apart; terminal portion of both short and elongated spiciform botrya inflorescence types often bearing undeveloped flowers and active vegetative growth. Inflorescence axis densely invested in antrorse-appressed, weakly flexuose, silky hairs. Pherophylls, leaf-like, 1–2 per flower, hairy (rarely glabrous); lamina 6.0–12.8 × 0.9–2.2 mm, dark silvery-green, silvery-grey or glaucous (depending one extent of hair covering), linear to linear-falcate; apex acute, base attenuate; lamina margin densely covered by antrorse-appressed, sericeous hairs, rarely glabrous. Pedicels sessile to subsessile, up to 1.2 mm long, copiously invested with silky, antrorse-appressed, weakly flexuose hairs. Flower buds ovoid, double conic to pyriform, apex sharply erect; calyx lobes pinched at base inwards, touching prior to bud burst. Flowers 1.9–5.7 mm diam. Hypanthium 2.0–4.0 × 2.5–4.1 mm, copiously covered in silvery-white to silvery-grey hairs or glaborus; barrel-shaped, cupular or narrowly campanulate, rim bearing 5 persistent sharply erect calyx lobes; hypanthium usually completely covered in a dense covering of long, silky, antrorse-appressed silvery hairs. Calyx lobes 5, erect, 1.0–1.6 × 0.2–0.6 mm, narrowly deltoid to deltoid with acute tips, red-green, densely covered in long, silky, silvery, antrorse-appressed, hairs or glabrous. Receptacle green or pink at anthesis, usually darkening to crimson after fertilisation. Petals 5–6, 0.9–2.0 × 0.7–1.9 mm, cream, pale pink or cream basally flushed pink, narrowly ovate to suborbicular, suberect, apex rounded, margins ± finely and irregularly crumpled, oil glands colourless. Stamens 32–46(–60) in 1–2 weakly defined whorls, arising from receptacular rim, filaments cream. Anthers dorsifixed, 0.04–0.06 × 0.02–0.04 mm, testiculate, latrorse. Pollen white. Anther connective gland prominent, pale pink or golden-yellow when fresh, drying yellow to pale orange, spheroidal, finely to coarsely papillate. Ovary 3–5 locular, each with 18–30 ovules in two rows on each placental lobe. Style 0.8–2.0 mm long, cream or pale pink; stigma narrowly capitate, as wide as, or slightly wider than style, ± flat, greenish-white or pink, flushing red after anthesis, surface finely granular-papillate. Fruits 1.6–2.9 × 2.3–4.1 mm, initially silvery-white or silvery-grey due to dense hair covering, maturing grey-brown to grey-black, barrel-shaped to narrowly obconic, rarely campanulate to cupular, calyx valves prominently erect. Seeds 0.50–1.10 × 0.48–0.70 mm, obovoid, oblong, oblong-ellipsoid, or cylindrical; testa semi-glossy, orange-brown to dark brown, surface coarsely reticulate.