Zieria tuberculata

Zieria tuberculata, commonly known as warty zieria, is a plant in the citrus family Rutaceae and is endemic to a small area on the south coast of New South Wales. It is a shrub with warty, hairy branches and leaves and large groups of creamy-white, four-petalled flowers in late winter to spring.

Description

Zieria tuberculata is a shrub that grows to a height of and has warty branches and leaves which are also covered with star-like hairs, usually visible only with a magnifier. The leaves are composed of three narrow leaflets with the central one, long and wide with a stalk long. The leaflets are dull green on the upper surface, whitish and warty on the lower side.
The flowers are creamy-white and are arranged in upper leaf axils in large groups of up to 200. The groups are shorter than the leaves and each flower is in diameter on a stalk long. There are four narrow triangular sepal lobes less than long and four petals long. In common with other zierias, there are only four stamens. Flowering occurs from late winter to spring.

Taxonomy and naming

Zieria tuberculata was first formally described in 2002 by James Armstrong and the description was published in Australian Systematic Botany. The specific epithet is a Latin word meaning 'full of lumps'.

Distribution and habitat

This zieria occurs in the Mount Gulaga area, growing in exposed, rocky outcrops on the edge of rainforest.

Ecology

This species is pollinated by pollen-feeding beetles and flies and by nectar-feeding flies.

Conservation

Zieria tuberculata is listed as "vulnerable" under the Commonwealth Government Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 Act and under the New South Wales NSW Threatened Species Conservation Act. About 900 individual plants from eight populations in an area of about are known. The main threats to its survival are habitat destruction caused by grazing animals and the weeds lantata and ivy.