Synaphea brachyceras
Synaphea brachyceras is a species of flowering plant in the family Proteaceae and is endemic to the south-west of Western Australia. It is a small, rounded, prostrate shrub with leaves sometimes lance-shaped or three-lobed to pinnatipartite, and moderately crowded yellow flowers.
Description
Synaphea brachyceras is a rounded, prostrate shrub that typically grows to a height of up to and wide with several stems up to long. The leaves are wide, sometimes lance-shaped with the narrower end towards the base, or three-lobed, or pinnatipartite. The distance from the base of the leaf to the lowest lobe is, the lowest lobe long and the end lobe long and wide. The flowers are yellow and borne on a moderately crowded spike long, and shorter or just longer than the leaves, on a peduncle long with egg-shaped bracts. The perianth is gaping, the upper tepal long and wide, the lower tepal long. Flowering occurs from August to October and the fruit is elliptic, covered with soft hairs, about long with a top-shaped seed, about long.
Taxonomy
Synaphea brachyceras was first formally described in 2000 by Ryonen Butcher in the journal Nuytsia from specimens collected north-west of the Arthur River in 1998. The specific epithet means 'short horn', referring to a projection on the back of the stugma.
Distribution and habitat
This species of Synaphea grows in clayey sand and sandy gravel on flats and slight slopes in shrubby woodland in the Arthur River - Highbury area in the Avon Wheatbelt and Jarrah Forest bioregions of south-western Western Australia.
Conservation status
Synaphea boyaginensis is listed as "Priority Three" by the Government of Western Australia Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions, meaning that it is poorly known and known from only a few locations but is not under imminent threat.