Commersonia obliqua


Commersonia obliqua is a species of flowering plant in the family Malvaceae and is endemic to Vanuatu. It is a shrub or tree with lance-shaped leaves and white flowers.

Description

Commersonia obliqua is a shrub or tree that typically grows to a height of, its branchlets covered with soft, star-shaped hairs. The leaves are lance-shaped, long and wide on a petiole long with narrowly triangular stipules long at the base. The flowers are in diameter with five petal-like sepals, the lobes broadly egg-shaped, long, and five petals long with a ligule long on the end. Flowering occurs from April to September and the fruit is a bristly capsule in diameter.

Taxonomy

Commersonia obliqua was first formally described in 2005 by Gordon P. Guymer in the journal Austrobaileya from specimens collected near Undine Bay in 1928. The specific epithet refers to the oblique leaf bases.

Distribution and habitat

This commersonia grows in tropical lowland rainforest in Vanuatu.