''Pityrodia pungens'' is a flowering plant in the mint family

Lamiaceae The Lamiaceae ( ) or Labiatae are a family of flowering plants commonly known as the mint, deadnettle or sage family. Many of the plants are aromatic in all parts and include widely used culinary herbs like basil, mint, rosemary, sage, savory ...

and is endemic to the northern part of the Northern Territory. It is an erect, spreading shrub with narrow, prickly leaves and off-white, bell-like flowers with dark purple streaks.

Description

''Pityrodia pungens'' is a straggling shrub which grows to a height of and has branches sometimes covered with star-like hairs. The leaves are linear to narrow lance-shaped, usually long, wide with a sharp point on the end. The flowers are arranged singly in upper leaf

axil A leaf ( : leaves) is any of the principal appendages of a vascular plant stem, usually borne laterally aboveground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", while the leaves, st ...

s and are shorter than the leaves. There are leaf-like

bract In botany, a bract is a modified or specialized leaf, especially one associated with a reproductive structure such as a flower, inflorescence axis or cone scale. Bracts are usually different from foliage leaves. They may be smaller, larger, or of ...

s and lance-shaped bracteoles long at the base of the flowers. The sepals are joined for less than half their length to form a bell-shaped tube with five lance-shaped, hairy lobes long. The five

petal Petals are modified Leaf, leaves that surround the reproductive parts of flowers. They are often advertising coloration, brightly colored or unusually shaped to attract pollinators. All of the petals of a flower are collectively known as the ''c ...

s are off-white, long and joined to form a bell-like tube with five lobes on the end. The two upper lobes have dark purple streaks and are long and smaller than the lower lobes. The upper lobes are shorter than or about equal to the length of the sepals. The lower middle lobe is larger than the others. The petals are glabrous except for soft hairs on the outside of the petal lobes and a dense hairy ring below the

stamen The stamen (plural ''stamina'' or ''stamens'') is the pollen-producing reproductive organ of a flower. Collectively the stamens form the androecium., p. 10 Morphology and terminology A stamen typically consists of a stalk called the filame ...

s. The four stamens extend slightly beyond the end of the tube, the lower pair slightly longer than the other one. Flowering occurs mainly from January to June and is followed by an oval-shaped, hairy fruit about long and wide.

Taxonomy and naming

''Pityrodia pungens'' was first formally described in 1979 by

Ahmad Abid Munir Ahmad ( ar, أحمد, ʾAḥmad) is an Arabic male given name common in most parts of the Muslim world. Other spellings of the name include Ahmed and Ahmet. Etymology The word derives from the root (ḥ-m-d), from the Arabic (), from the ve ...

from a specimen collected in the Nitmiluk National Park. The description was published in ''Journal of the Adelaide Botanic Gardens''. 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 ...

(''pungens'') is a Latin word meaning "sharp", "acrid", "biting" or "piercing".

Distribution

This pityrodia occurs in the northern part of the Northern Territory.

Conservation

''Pityrodia pungens'' is classified as "least concern" under the

Territory Parks and Wildlife Conservation Act 2000 A territory is an area of land, sea, or space, particularly belonging or connected to a country, person, or animal. In international relations, international politics, a territory is usually either the total area from which a state may extr ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q15350160 pungens Plants described in 1979 Flora of the Northern Territory