''Homoranthus clarksonii'' is a flowering plant in the family

Myrtaceae Myrtaceae, the myrtle family, is a family of dicotyledonous plants placed within the order Myrtales. Myrtle, pōhutukawa, bay rum tree, clove, guava, acca (feijoa), allspice, and eucalyptus are some notable members of this group. All speci ...

and 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 a small area in

Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , established_ ...

. It is an upright shrub with pointed, linear leaves and pairs of creamy pink to pale yellow flowers which turn pink as they age. It is only known from small populations on

Mount Mulligan Mount Mulligan is a former mining town and now a rural locality in the Shire of Mareeba, Queensland, Australia. In the Mount Mulligan had a population of 4 people. It is the site of the Mount Mulligan mine disaster, Queensland's worst mining ...

Description

Flowering occurs sporadically throughout the year, peak flowering from March to May.

Taxonomy and naming

''Homoranthus clarksonii'' was first formally described in 2011 by Lachlan Copeland,

Lyndley Craven Lyndley Alan Craven (3 September 1945 – 11 July 2014) was a botanist who became the Principal Research Scientist of the Australian National Herbarium. Lyndley ("Lyn") Craven worked for the CSIRO plant taxonomy unit of the New Guinea Survey Gro ...

and Jeremy Bruhl from a specimen collected on Mount Mulligan in 2001 and the description was published in ''

Australian Systematic Botany ''Australian Systematic Botany'' is an international peer-reviewed scientific journal published by CSIRO Publishing. It is devoted to publishing original research, and sometimes review articles, on topics related to systematic botany, such as bio ...

''. 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 ...

(''clarksonii'') honours John Richard Clarkson who discovered the species.

Distribution and habitat

''Homoranthus clarksonii'' grows in shallow, sandy soils amongst sandstone boulders on the north western edge of

Atherton Tablelands The Atherton Tableland is a fertile plateau which is part of the Great Dividing Range in Queensland, Australia. The principal river flowing across the plateau is the Barron River. It was dammed to form an irrigation reservoir named Lake Tinar ...

west of

Mareeba Mareeba is a rural town and locality in the Shire of Mareeba in Far North Queensland, Australia. Between 2008 and 2013, it was within the Tablelands Region. The town's name is derived from an Aboriginal word meaning ''meeting of the waters'' ...

Conservation status

This homoranthus is restricted to Mount Mulligan. A ROTAP conservation code of 2V following Briggs and Leigh (1996). IUCN (2010) vulnerable.

References

External links

The Australasian Virtual Herbarium – Occurrence data for ''Homoranthus clarksonii''
{{Taxonbar, from=Q56280701 clarksonii Flora of Queensland Myrtales of Australia Plants described in 2011