''Oedera imbricata'' is a prickly shrublet belonging to the family
Asteraceae
The family Asteraceae, alternatively Compositae, consists of over 32,000 known species of flowering plants in over 1,900 genera within the order Asterales. Commonly referred to as the aster, daisy, composite, or sunflower family, Compositae w ...
.
It is indigenous to the southern Cape region of
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...
, where it occurs in
Fynbos
Fynbos (; meaning fine plants) is a small belt of natural shrubland or heathland vegetation located in the Western Cape and Eastern Cape provinces of South Africa. This area is predominantly coastal and mountainous, with a Mediterranean clim ...
and
Renosterveld vegetation, from the West Coast, eastwards as far as Grahamstown.
Description
''Oedera imbricata'' is a small (50 cm high), sprawling shrublet. The leaves are small (15 x 5 mm), hard and stiff, with a prominent midrib. They grow densely packed along the stems.
The yellow flowerheads appear in Spring. They are 40mm wide, consist of more than one individual flowerheads (a diagnostic character), of which the outer ones have visible ray-florets.
Related species
It resembles ''
Oedera capensis'', which however has longer, spreading, marginally-toothed leaves.
References
{{Taxonbar, from=Q15571095
Endemic flora of the Cape Provinces
imbricata
This list of Latin and Greek words commonly used in systematic names is intended to help those unfamiliar with classical languages to understand and remember the scientific names of organisms. The binomial nomenclature used for animals and plants i ...
Renosterveld