''Scaevola albida'', commonly known as pale fan-flower or small-fruit fan-flower, is a flowering plant in the family Goodeniaceae. It is a spreading perennial herb with pale blue or white fan-shaped flowers and obovate leaves. It grows in Queensland through eastern New South Wales and coastal areas of Victoria and Tasmania.

Description

''Scaevola albida'' is a mat forming ground cover growing up to high and wide. The leaves are elliptic to egg-shaped, wavy, bright green, semi-succulent and slightly hairy, long, wide, margins smooth or toothed, and

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 ...

. The flowers are borne in upper leaf axils on stems to long, five petaled, corolla white, pale blue or lilac, long with white, more or less flattened hairs on the outer surface. Flowering occurs mostly from October to January and the fruit urn-like shaped, usually one-seeded, papery and long.

Taxonomy and naming

''Scaevola albida'' was first formally described in 1917 and the description was published in ''The Botanical Exchange Club and Society of the British Isles''. 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 ...

(''albida'') means "white".

Distribution and habitat

Pale fan-flower grows near coastal scrubland, grassy headlands and ranges in New South Wales, Tasmania, South Australia, Victoria and Queensland.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q7429627 albida Flora of New South Wales Flora of Queensland Flora of South Australia Flora of Tasmania Flora of Victoria (state)