Felicia Macrorrhiza

''Felicia macrorrhiza'' is a small, evergreen shrub in the family Asteraceae. This species grows in the Karoo region of South Africa. It is called Aspoestertjie in Afrikaans.

It is more or less strongly branched, growing up to high. It has narrow leaves, crowded on the younger stems, which leave a dry, persistent leaf base on older branches. The flower heads lack ray florets but contain many yellow disc florets.

Description

''Felicia macrorrhiza'' is an evergreen, more or less strongly branched dwarf shrub of up to high, with a strongly gnarled woody base. The branches are covered with gray brown bark and some long hairs. Older branches are densely set with persistent dry leaf bases, the younger ones with leaves. The leaves are alternately set, linear, sometimes spoon-shaped, more or less succulent, 1–2 cm long and wide, with up to wide, pale, ciliate margin, the inner base with long woolly hairs, evenly long-haired.

The large flower heads are set individually on top sparingly hairy, towards the top more densely hairy, up to long stalks with some small leaves along their lengths. The involucre is about 1 cm in diameter and consists of about four rows of lance-shaped, green, overlapping bracts, often with the margin tinged reddish, hardly papery and ciliate towards the tip. The outer involucral bracts are about long and wide with long hairs, the inner bracts long and 1 mm wide with fewer long hairs. The flower heads never have ray florets. There are many disc florets with a yellow corolla of up to long, in the center of each of these are five anthers merged into a tube, through which the style grows when the floret opens, hoovering up the pollen on its shaft. At the tip of both style branches is a triangular appendage. Around the base of the corolla are many yellowish white pappus bristles of two different lengths. The longer pappus bristles are about long, toothed, with a long pointy tip. The shorter pappus bristles are up to 1 mm long. Below the base of each corolla is a red-brown, dry, one-seeded, indehiscent fruit called cypsela that is about long and wide, inverted egg-shape in outline, with a slight ridge along the edge. The surface has few scales and long silky hairs, often with a narrow hairless zone bordering the edge.

Heads without ray florets also occur from time to time in related species of the section ''Lignofelicia'', in particular ''F. whitehillensis'', ''F. filifolia'' subsp. ''bodkinii'' and subsp. ''schaeferi''.

Taxonomy

This species of daisy was first described in 1800 by Carl Thunberg, who named it ''Aster macrorrhizus''. In 1836, Augustin Pyramus de Candolle assigned Thunberg's type to the genus ''Felicia'', so creating ''Felicia macrorrhiza''. He also described another collection in the same publication, which he called ''Fresenia scaposa''. When Ernst Gottlieb von Steudel accepted De Candole’s name, a printing error was made, and the name ''Fresenia stuposa'' was published in 1840. In 1917, John Hutchinson distinguished ''Fresenia nana''. In 1973, Jürke Grau considered all these names synonymous to ''Felicia macrorrhiza''. The species is considered part of the section '' Lignofelicia''.

Conservation

The continued survival of ''Felicia macrorrhiza'' is considered to be of least concern because its population is stable.

References

External links

Line drawing of ''Felicia macrorrhiza''

Distribution map of ''Felicia macrorrhiza''

{{Taxonbar, from=Q15598848

macrorrhiza
Endemic flora of the Cape Provinces
Plants described in 1800