''Melaleuca pomphostoma'' 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-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 ...

of Western Australia. It is a small, dense shrub with fleshy, narrow leaves, greenish-yellow flowers. It is similar and closely related to '' Melaleuca bracteosa'' but differs in the colour and number of stamens in each flower.

Description

''Melaleuca pomphostoma'' is a shrub which grows to about tall with thick, rough, slightly spongy grey bark. Its leaves are arranged alternately, glabrous, fleshy, long and wide and very narrow egg-shaped with a rounded end. The flowers are arranged in heads or short spikes containing 3 to 12 individual flowers, the spike about wide. They are greenish-yellow with the stamens arranged in five bundles around each flower, the bundles containing 11 to 18 stamens. The flowering season is in autumn and winter and is followed by fruit which are woody capsules long. ''Melaleuca pomphostoma'' is similar to '' Melaleuca bracteosa'' but differs from it in having fewer stamens (''M. bracteosa'' has 7 to 11 per bundle), a different leaf shape and distinctive, numerous, white raised

stoma In botany, a stoma (from Greek ''στόμα'', "mouth", plural "stomata"), also called a stomate (plural "stomates"), is a pore found in the epidermis of leaves, stems, and other organs, that controls the rate of gas exchange. The pore is bor ...

ta, which are barely visible with a hand lens, on the leaf blades.

Taxonomy and naming

''Melaleuca pomphostoma'' was first formally described in 1992 by Bryan Barlow in Nuytsia as a new species. 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 ...

(''pomphostoma'') is from the Ancient Greek words ''pomphos'' meaning "a blister" and ''stoma'' meaning "mouth" referring to the raised stomata on the lower leaf surface.

Distribution and habitat

This melaleuca is confined to the

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 ...

district and the eastern end of the Fitzgerald River National Park in the Esperance Plains

biogeographic region An ecoregion (ecological region) or ecozone (ecological zone) is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than a bioregion, which in turn is smaller than a biogeographic realm. Ecoregions cover relatively large areas of l ...

where it usually grows in sand or clayey loam

Conservation

''Melaleuca pomphostoma'' 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

{{Taxonbar, from=Q15372480 pomphostoma Myrtales of Australia Plants described in 1992 Endemic flora of Western Australia