Scaevola albida
Scaevola albida, commonly known as pale fan-flower or small-fruit fan-flower, is a flowering plant in the family Goodeniaceae, and is endemic to eastern Australia. It is a prostrate to ascending perennial herb with egg-shaped to elliptic leaves, sometimes with toothed edges, pale blue or white fan-shaped flowers and elliptic fruit.
Description
Scaevola albida is a prostrate to ascending perennial herb that typically grows up to high with stems sometimes covered with soft hairs. The leaves are elliptic to egg-shaped, wavy, bright green, semi-succulent and slightly hairy, long, wide, margins smooth or toothed, and sessile. The flowers are borne in upper leaf axils on stems up to long, with five white, pale blue or lilac petals, long with white, more or less flattened hairs on the outer surface. Flowering occurs mostly from October to January and the fruit is an urn-like shaped, usually one-seeded, papery fruit long.
Taxonomy and naming
Thi species was first formally described in 1794 by James Edward Smith who gave it the name Goodenia albida in the Transactions of the Linnean Society of London, from specimens collected by John White in Port Jackson. In 1917, George Claridge Druce transferred the species to Scaevola as S. albida in The Botanical Exchange Club and Society of the British Isles. The specific epithet means "white".
Pale fan-flower grows near coastal scrubland, grassy headlands and ranges in New South Wales, Tasmania, South Australia, Victoria and Queensland.