Pultenaea whiteana


Pultenaea whiteana is a species of flowering plant in the family Fabaceae and is endemic to a restricted area of south-eastern Queensland. It is an erect shrub with linear leaves and yellow to orange flowers.

Description

Pultenaea whiteana is an erect shrub that typically grows to a height of and has sparsely hairy foliage. The leaves are arranged alternately, linear, long and wide with the edges sometimes curving upwards and with stipules long at the base. The flowers are arranged in dense clusters with leaf-like bracts at the base and three-lobed bracteoles long. The sepals are long and the petals are yellow to orange. The standard is long, the wings long and the keel long. Flowering occurs from August to January and the fruit is a pod long.

Taxonomy and naming

Pultenaea whiteana was first formally described in 1951 by Stanley Thatcher Blake in The Queensland Naturalist from specimens he collected on Mount Maroon in "more or less heath-like vegetation on the upper rocky slopes" in 1948. The specific epithet honours Cyril Tenison White.

Distribution and habitat

This species of pea grows in heath, forest understorey and on cliffs at an altitude of on Mount Barney and Mount Maroon in south-eastern Queensland.