''Hakea lehmanniana'', commonly known as the blue hakea, is a shrub in 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 ...

. It has needle-shaped prickly leaves and blue flowers during winter months. It 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 an area in the southern Wheatbelt and Great Southern regions of

Western Australia Western Australia (commonly abbreviated as WA) is a state of Australia occupying the western percent of the land area of Australia excluding external territories. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to th ...

Description

''Hakea lehmanniana'' is a prickly, dense shrub typically growing to a height of and does not form a

lignotuber A lignotuber is a woody swelling of the root crown possessed by some plants as a protection against destruction of the plant stem, such as by fire. Other woody plants may develop basal burls as a similar survival strategy, often as a response t ...

. It blooms from June to August and produces attractive purple-blue fading to blue or white flowers in dense clusters in upper leaf axils. The leaves are

glabrous Glabrousness (from the Latin ''glaber'' meaning "bald", "hairless", "shaved", "smooth") is the technical term for a lack of hair, down, setae, trichomes or other such covering. A glabrous surface may be a natural characteristic of all or part of ...

terete Terete is a term in botany used to describe a cross section that is circular, or like a distorted circle, with a single surface wrapping around it.Lichen Vocabulary, Lichens of North America Information, Sylvia and Stephen Sharnoff/ref> This is us ...

, long by thick and ending in a sharp point at the apex. The fruit are 3 dimensional, long by wide with a very rough prickly surface a unique feature which identifies this species.

Distribution and habitat

Blue hakea grows from Pingelly ranging south to Albany and east to

Ravensthorpe Ravensthorpe may refer to any of the following places. England *Ravensthorpe, Dewsbury in West Yorkshire **Ravensthorpe railway station, Dewsbury *Ravensthorpe, Northamptonshire *Ravensthorpe, Peterborough in Cambridgeshire *Ravensthorpe, an histor ...

. Grows in heath or shrubland on gravelly-loam, sand or sand over

laterite Laterite is both a soil and a rock type rich in iron and aluminium and is commonly considered to have formed in hot and wet tropical areas. Nearly all laterites are of rusty-red coloration, because of high iron oxide content. They develop by ...

in sun or semi-shade. An adaptable species frost and drought tolerant and may be used as a ground cover and wildlife habitat.

Taxonomy and naming

''Hakea lehmanniana'' was first formally described in 1845 by Swiss botanist

Carl Meisner Carl Daniel Friedrich Meissner (1 November 1800 – 2 May 1874) was a Swiss botanist. Biography Born in Bern, Switzerland on 1 November 1800, he was christened Meisner but later changed the spelling of his name to Meissner. For most of his 40 ...

and the description was published in ''

Plantae Preissianae ''Plantae preissianae sive enumeratio plantarum quas in australasia occidentali et meridionali-occidentali annis 1838-1841 collegit Ludovicus Preiss'', more commonly known as ''Plantae preissianae'', is a book written by Johann Georg Christian Leh ...

''. The species was named in honour of the German botanist,

Johann Georg Christian Lehmann Johann Georg Christian Lehmann (25 February 1792 – 12 February 1860) was a German botanist. Born at Haselau, near Uetersen, Holstein, Lehmann studied medicine in Copenhagen and Göttingen, obtained a doctorate in medicine in 1813 and a doct ...

Conservation status

Hakea lehmanniana is classified as "not threatened" by the Western Australian Government.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q18083086 lehmanniana Eudicots of Western Australia Plants described in 1845