Cyphanthera albicans
Cyphanthera albicans, commonly known as grey ray flower, is a species of flowering plant in the family Solanaceae and is endemic to south-eastern continental Australia. It is an upright shrub with grey foliage and cream, white or pale yellow flowers.
Description
Cyphanthera albicans is an upright shrub to high, greyish, branches covered densely in short, matted hairs or soft, short hairs. Older leaves are oval to elliptic or more or less egg-shaped, long, wide, lamina covered densely in short matted hairs, younger leaves up to long and wide. The corolla is cream or light yellow with purple markings, long, smooth or with soft hairs, lobes oval to squared to nearly linear and long. Flowering occurs from spring to early summer and the fruit a capsule long.Taxonomy and naming
This species was described in 1853 by Allan Cunningham who gave it the name Anthocercis albicans. In 1853John Miers transferred the species to Cyphanthera as C. albicans in The Annals and Magazine of Natural History. The specific epithet means "becoming white" or "whitish".
In 1981, Laurie Haegi described three subspecies of C. albicans in the journal Telopea and the names are accepted by the Australian Plant Census:Cyphanthera albicans Miers subsp. albicans has white to creamy-white flowers long, leaves mostly long and hairs long on the branches.Cyphanthera albicans subsp. notabilis Haegi has white to creamy-white flowers long, leaves mostly long and wide, and woolly hairs long on the branches.Cyphanthera albicans subsp. tomentosa Haegi has yellow or pale yellow flowers long, leaves mostly long and hairs less than long on the branches.