Conospermum burgessiorum

Conospermum burgessiorum is a species of flowering plant in family Proteaceae and is endemic to eastern Australia. It is an erect to spreading shrub with linear leaves, panicles of cream-coloured to white flowers and reddish brown nuts.

Description

Conospermum burgessiorum is an erect to spreading shrub that typically grows to a height of and has many branches, the new growth with fine hairs. The leaves are linear, mostly long and wide and slightly curved. Veins are visible on both surfaces of the leaves. The flowers are arranged in panicles in upper leaf axils on peduncles up to long. The bracts are long and blue, the perianth cream-coloured to white forming a tube long. The upper lip is long and wide, the lower lip joined for with lobes long and wide. Flowering occurs from September to December, and the fruit is a nut about long and wide with reddish-brown hairs.

Taxonomy

Conospermum burgessiorum was first formally described in 1975 by Lawrie Johnson and Donald McGillivray in the journal Telopea from specimens they collected in the Gibraltar Range in 1966. The specific epithet honours Colin Burgess and his son Peter Burgess, who recognised this species as distinct from Conospermum longifolium.

Distribution and habitat

This species of Conospermum usually grows in forest and woodland on soils derived from granite, in the Gibraltar Range National Park in northern New South Wales, and near Stanthorpe in south-eastern Queensland.