''Melaleuca apodocephala'' is a plant in the myrtle

family Family (from la, familia) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its ...

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 the

south-west The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each se ...

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 ...

. It is a low, bushy shrub with crowded, grey-green leaves, corky bark and a profusion of creamy-yellow flowers on the sides of the branches.

Description

''Melaleuca apodocephala'' sometimes grows to a height of but often much less. It has grey-green, glabrous, linear leaves which are mostly long, wide, arranged alternately on the stems. The ends of the leaves are pointed without being prickly. The flowers are creamy-white with yellow stamens, arranged in roughly spherical clusters along the branches. Each cluster is up to in diameter and contains up to 15 individual flowers. The stamens are in five bundles around the flower and there are 6-13 stamens per bundle. The main flowering season is in summer and is followed by fruit which are woody capsules long, arranged in nearly spherical clusters around the stem. Over time the clusters become embedded in the corky branches.

Taxonomy and naming

''Melaleuca apodocephala'' was first formally described in 1852 by Nikolai Turczaninow in "''Bulletin de la classe physico-mathematique de l'Academie Imperiale des sciences de Saint-Petersburg''". 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 ...

(''apodocephala'') is from the latinised Greek ''apodus'' meaning "sessile" and ''-cephalus'' meaning "headed", referring to the sessile fruiting capsules.

Distribution and habitat

This melaleuca occurs in and between the

Stirling Range The Stirling Range or Koikyennuruff is a range of mountains and hills in the Great Southern region of Western Australia, south-east of Perth. It is over wide from west to east, stretching from the highway between Mount Barker and Cranb ...

and Scaddan districts in the Esperance, Mallee and

Swan Coastal Plain The Swan Coastal Plain in Western Australia is the geographic feature which contains the Swan River as it travels west to the Indian Ocean. The coastal plain continues well beyond the boundaries of the Swan River and its tributaries, as a geol ...

biogeographic regions A biogeographic realm or ecozone is the broadest biogeographic division of Earth's land surface, based on distributional patterns of terrestrial organisms. They are subdivided into bioregions, which are further subdivided into ecoregions. De ...

. It grows in sand, rocky clay, loam on limestone cliffs, in saline depressions, dunes and swales.

Conservation status

''Melaleuca apodocephala'' is classified as "not threatened" by the

Government of Western Australia The Government of Western Australia, formally referred to as His Majesty's Government of Western Australia, is the Australian state democratic administrative authority of Western Australia. It is also commonly referred to as the WA Government o ...

Department of Parks and Wildlife The Department of Parks and Wildlife (DPaW) was the department of the Government of Western Australia responsible for managing lands described in the ''Conservation and Land Management Act 1984'' and implementing the state's conservation and e ...

References

{{Use dmy dates, date=March 2018 apodocephala Myrtales of Australia Plants described in 1852 Endemic flora of Western Australia Taxa named by Nikolai Turczaninow