Veronica glaucophylla

Detailed description

Bushy shrub to 2 m tall. Branches erect, old stems brown; branchlets green or red-brown, puberulent or pubescent, hairs bifarious (usually) or uniform; internodes (1-) 2-7 (-9) mm; leaf decurrencies evident to obscure (sometimes with narrow ridges along margins and medial line of each decurrency, and sometimes also with a slight bulge immediately below each leaf scar). Leaf bud distinct; sinus absent. Leaves erecto-patent (mostly) to patent or recurved (with age); lamina oblong or elliptic or lanceolate, subcoriaceous, flat or slightly concave, (7-) 9-25 x (2-) 3-7 (-8) mm; apex subacute or acute; 2 lateral secondary veins very faintly evident at base of fresh leaves; midrib thickened below and depressed to grooved above (weakly, and not evident near leaf apex); margin sometimes minutely cartilaginous, minutely papillate and either ciliolate (with minute antrorse hairs) or glabrous; upper surface glaucous, with many stomata, glabrous or hairy along midrib (with minute eglandular and/or glandular hairs); lower surface glaucous. Inflorescences with 15-31 flowers, lateral, unbranched, (1.3-) 1.9-3.9 (-4.6) cm, longer than (usually) or about equal to subtending leaves (rarely); peduncle 0.4-0.8 (-1) cm; rachis (0.9-) 1.3-3 (-3.6) cm. Bracts alternate (although often with an opposite/subopposite pair at base), lanceolate or deltoid (sometimes narrowly), obtuse to acute. rarely hairy outside. Flowers all hermaphrodite or possibly hermaphrodite or female (on different plants). Pedicels 0.5-2 (-3) mm, hairy (usually) or glabrous (rarely). Calyx 1.5-2.2 mm; lobes ovate or lanceolate or oblong, obtuse (usually) or subacute, very rarely hairy outside. Corolla tube hairy inside; tube of hermaphrodite flowers 1.1-2.3 x t. 1.7 mm, funnelform or contracted at base, shorter than to longer than calyx (mostly shorter than or equal to calyx, but some specimens from the Hanmer area have corolla tubes slightly longer than the calyx); lobes white at anthesis, circular or rhomboid or oblong (broadly) or obovate, obtuse (sometimes emarginate), patent, longer than corolla tube, sometimes with a few hairs toward base on inner surface. Stamen filaments incurved at apex in bud, 3-4.6 mm; anthers pink or yellow, 1.7-2 mm. Ovary hairy, approximately 1-1.2 mm; ovules 8-10 per locule; style 3-5.3 mm, often hairy. Capsules obtuse or subacute, 2.5-4 x 1.9-3.1 mm, usually hairy, loculicidal split extending ¼-¾-way to base. Seeds flattened, broad ellipsoid, brown, 1.6-2.2 x 1.3-1.5 mm, micropylar rim approximately 0.6 mm.