''Hakea grammatophylla'' is a shrub of the family

Proteaceae The Proteaceae form a family of flowering plants predominantly distributed in the Southern Hemisphere. The family comprises 83 genera with about 1,660 known species. Together with the Platanaceae and Nelumbonaceae, they make up the order Pro ...

that is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

to the Northern Territory, Australia. It is a variable, sparsely branched shrub with pink to reddish flowers from March to late winter.

Description

''Hakea grammatophylla'' is a small variable shrub growing to a height of sometimes erect but sparsely branched. The branchlets are either thickly or sparingly covered with flattened hairs becoming more or less smooth at flowering. The leaves are long, flat, and narrowly egg-shaped long, wide with 5-9 distinct veins. The

inflorescence An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Morphologically, it is the modified part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed o ...

consists of 100-150 red to deep pink scented blooms in a

raceme A raceme ( or ) or racemoid is an unbranched, indeterminate type of inflorescence bearing flowers having short floral stalks along the shoots that bear the flowers. The oldest flowers grow close to the base and new flowers are produced as the s ...

on a stem long that is covered with short, soft matted hairs. The

pedicel Pedicle or pedicel may refer to: Human anatomy *Pedicle of vertebral arch, the segment between the transverse process and the vertebral body, and is often used as a radiographic marker and entry point in vertebroplasty and kyphoplasty procedures ...

is smooth,

perianth The perianth (perigonium, perigon or perigone in monocots) is the non-reproductive part of the flower, and structure that forms an envelope surrounding the sexual organs, consisting of the calyx (sepals) and the corolla (petals) or tepals when ...

bright pink and smooth and the

pistil Gynoecium (; ) is most commonly used as a collective term for the parts of a flower that produce ovules and ultimately develop into the fruit and seeds. The gynoecium is the innermost whorl of a flower; it consists of (one or more) ''pistils'' ...

long. Flowering occurs mostly from March to August. The fruit are narrow and fairly smooth about long tapering to a point.

Taxonomy and naming

The species was first formally described by the botanist

Ferdinand von Mueller Baron Sir Ferdinand Jacob Heinrich von Mueller, (german: Müller; 30 June 1825 – 10 October 1896) was a German-Australian physician, geographer, and most notably, a botanist. He was appointed government botanist for the then colony of Vict ...

in 1868 and the description was published in '' Fragmenta Phytographiae Australiae''. The

specific epithet In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

(''grammatophylla'') is derived from the Latin '- meaning "striped with fine lines" and -' meaning "leaf", referring to the prominent fine veins in the leaves.

Distribution and habitat

A rare species confined to the

MacDonnell Ranges The MacDonnell Ranges, or Tjoritja in Arrernte, is a mountain range located in southern Northern Territory. MacDonnell Ranges is also the name given to an interim Australian bioregion broadly encompassing the mountain range, with an area of .< ...

extending from the George Gill Ranges in the west to the

White Range The White Range is a subrange of the Tagish Highland, located east of Windy Arm on the British Columbia-Yukon border in Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocea ...

in the east growing in soil pockets amongst rocky slopes and river gorges.

Conservation status

''Hakea grammatophylla'' is considered rare due to its restricted distribution by Briggs and Leigh 1995.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q18079608 maconochieana Flora of the Northern Territory Plants described in 1868 Taxa named by Ferdinand von Mueller