''Melaleuca eurystoma'' is a plant in the myrtle 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 to the south of Western Australia. It is a small shrub with pale lemon to greenish flowers and egg-shaped to almost oval leaves.

Description

''Melaleuca eurystoma'' is a shrub growing to tall with mostly glabrous branches, leaves and flower parts. Its leaves are arranged alternately, long, wide, egg-shaped to almost oval with a wedge-shaped base and a rounded end. Melaleuca eurystoma fruit

The flowers are yellow or greenish-yellow and arranged in heads or spikes on the ends of branches which continue to grow after flowering, sometimes also on the sides of the branches. The heads are up to in diameter and composed of 5 to 20 individual flowers. The petals are long and fall off as the flower ages. There are five bundles of stamens around the flower, each with 7 to 15 stamens. Flowering occurs mainly in early spring and is followed by fruit which are woody capsules long.

Taxonomy and naming

''Melaleuca eurystoma'' was first formally described in 1999 by Lyndley Craven in '' Australian Systematic Botany'' from a specimen collected near

Tarin Rock Tarin Rock () is a locality, railway siding and rock formation on the Wagin to Lake Grace branch line, located approximately 18 km east of Kukerin in Western Australia. The surrounding areas produce wheat and other cereal crops. The prim ...

. 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 ...

(''eurystoma'') is from the ancient Greek ''eurys'' meaning "wide" and ''stoma'' meaning "mouth", referring to the unusually wide opening of the fruit.

Distribution and habitat

This melaleuca occurs in and between the

Lake King Lake King is a town in the eastern Wheatbelt region of Western Australia, from Perth along State Route 40 between Kelmscott and Ravensthorpe. As of 2016, the town had a population of 95. The 2011 census recorded both the population of the tow ...

, Corrigin and

Condingup Condingup is a town in the Goldfields–Esperance region of Western Australia, in the Shire of Esperance local government area, southeast of the state capital, Perth. At the 2016 census, it and the surrounding region had a population of 278. ...

districts in the Avon Wheatbelt, Esperance Plains and Mallee

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 ...

where it grows gravelly sand and

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 ...

Conservation status

''Melaleuca eurystoma'' is listed 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 ...

Gallery

Image:Melaleuca eurystoma (habit).JPG, Habit near

Image:Melaleuca eurystoma bark.jpg, Bark Image:Melaleuca eurystoma habit.jpg, Habit in a nature reserve near

Kulin Kulin may refer to: Places *Kulin, Western Australia, a small town in Australia ** Shire of Kulin, a local government area *Kulin, Iran, a village near Tehran *Kulin, Lower Silesian Voivodeship, a village in south-west Poland *Kulin, Kuyavian-Pome ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q6811017 eurystoma Plants described in 1999 Endemic flora of Western Australia Taxa named by Lyndley Craven