''Podolepis hieracioides'' commonly known as long podolepis, is a flowering plant in 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 ...

and grows in New South Wales and Victoria. It is a small perennial with yellow flowers.

Description

''Podolepis hieracioides'' is an upright, glabrous or woolly, bristly, sparingly branched perennial to high with a single or several stems. The basal leaves are lance or elliptic-shaped, up to long, stem-clasping,

sessile Sessility, or sessile, may refer to: * Sessility (motility), organisms which are not able to move about * Sessility (botany), flowers or leaves that grow directly from the stem or peduncle of a plant * Sessility (medicine), tumors and polyps that ...

and pointed at the apex. The leaves higher on the stems are narrowly lance-shaped to linear and up to long, rough to smooth, margins flat to rolled under, basal leaves elliptic The flower heads are borne in groupings of 2–6 in a scant elongated cyme, in diameter and long. The

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 are oval-shaped, smooth, middle bracts with thick glandular claws, long, slightly covered by adjoing bracts and the 15-30 florets pale yellow. Flowering occurs from December to April and the fruit is dry, one-seeded, bristly and long.

Taxonomy

''Podolepis hieracioides'' was first formally described in 1859 by

Ferdinand von Mueller Baron Sir Ferdinand Jacob Heinrich von Mueller, (german: Müller; 30 June 1825 – 10 October 1896) was a German-Australian physician, geographer, and most notably, a botanist. He was appointed government botanist for the then colony of Vict ...

and the description was published in '' Fragmenta Phytographiae Australiae''.

Distribution and habitat

Long podolepis grows in soils at lower altitudes or in shallow soils on hills mostly south of the Blue Mountains in New South Wales. In eastern Victoria it grows in subalpine and

montane Montane ecosystems are found on the slopes of mountains. The alpine climate in these regions strongly affects the ecosystem because temperatures fall as elevation increases, causing the ecosystem to stratify. This stratification is a crucial f ...

locations in grassland, woodlands and forests.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q15595040 hieracioides Flora of New South Wales Plants described in 1859