''Isopogon'', commonly known as conesticks, conebushes or coneflowers, is a genus of about forty species of flowering plants in the family

Proteaceae The Proteaceae form a family (biology), family of flowering plants predominantly distributed in the Southern Hemisphere. The family comprises 83 genus, genera with about 1,660 known species. Australia and South Africa have the greatest concentr ...

, and are

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

to Australia. They are shrubs with rigid leaves,

bisexual Bisexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior toward both males and females. It may also be defined as the attraction to more than one gender, to people of both the same and different gender, or the attraction t ...

flowers in a dense spike or "cone" and the fruit is a small, hairy nut.

Description

Plants in the genus ''Isopogon'' are erect or prostrate shrubs with rigid, usually compound, rarely simple leaves. Compound leaves are deeply divided with flat or cylindrical lobes. The flowers are usually arranged on the ends of branches, usually surrounded by

bracts In botany, a bract is a modified or specialized leaf, associated with a reproductive structure such as a flower, inflorescence axis or cone scale. Bracts are usually different from foliage leaves in size, color, shape or texture. They also loo ...

, in a more or less conical or spherical spike. Each flower is bisexual and symmetrical, the

tepal A tepal is one of the outer parts of a flower (collectively the perianth). The term is used when these parts cannot easily be classified as either sepals or petals. This may be because the parts of the perianth are undifferentiated (i.e. of very ...

s spreading as the flower develops, the lower part persisting until the fruit expands. The fruit are fused to form a woody cone-like to more or less spherical structure, each fruit a nut with bracts that eventually fall and release the fruit. ''Isopogon'' have 13

haploid Ploidy () is the number of complete sets of chromosomes in a cell (biology), cell, and hence the number of possible alleles for Autosome, autosomal and Pseudoautosomal region, pseudoautosomal genes. Here ''sets of chromosomes'' refers to the num ...

chromosomes.

Taxonomy

The genus ''Isopogon'' was first formally described in 1809 by Joseph Knight in ''

On the cultivation of the plants belonging to the natural order of Proteeae "On the cultivation of the plants belonging to the natural order of Proteeae" is an 1809 paper on the family Proteaceae of flowering plants. Although nominally written by Joseph Knight (gardener), Joseph Knight as a paper on cultivation techniques ...

'', preempting publication of the same name by

Robert Brown Robert Brown may refer to: Robert Brown (born 1965), British Director, Animator and author Entertainers and artists * Washboard Sam or Robert Brown (1910–1966), American musician and singer * Robert W. Brown (1917–2009), American printmaker ...

in his book ''

On the natural order of plants called Proteaceae "On the natural order of plants called Proteaceae", also published as "On the Proteaceae of Jussieu", was a paper written by Robert Brown on the taxonomy of the plant family Proteaceae. It was read to the Linnean Society of London in the first qua ...

''.

Species list

The following is a list of species, subspecies and varieties of ''Isopogon'' accepted by the

Australian Plant Census The Australian Plant Census (APC) provides an online interface to currently accepted, published, scientific names of the vascular flora of Australia, as one of the output interfaces of the national government Integrated Biodiversity Information Sys ...

as at November 2020: * '' Isopogon adenanthoides'' Meisn. (W.A.) - spider coneflower * '' Isopogon alcicornis'' Diels (W.A.) - elkhorn coneflower * '' Isopogon anemonifolius'' ( Salisb.) Knight (N.S.W.) - broad-leaved drumsticks * '' Isopogon anethifolius'' (Salisb.) Knight (N.S.W.) - narrow-leaved drumsticks * '' Isopogon asper'' R.Br. (W.A.) * '' Isopogon attenuatus'' R.Br. (W.A.) * '' Isopogon axillaris'' R.Br. (W.A.) * '' Isopogon baxteri'' R.Br. (W.A.) - Stirling Range coneflower * '' Isopogon buxifolius'' R.Br. (W.A.) ** ''Isopogon buxifolius'' R.Br. var. ''buxifolius'' ** ''Isopogon buxifolius'' var. ''obovatus'' (R.Br.)

Benth. George Bentham (22 September 1800 – 10 September 1884) was an English botanist, described by the weed botanist Duane Isely as "the premier systematic botanist of the nineteenth century". Born into a distinguished family, he initially studie ...

* '' Isopogon ceratophyllus'' R.Br. (S.A., Vic., Tas.) - wild Irishman, horny cone bush * '' Isopogon crithmifolius'' F.Muell. (W.A.) * '' Isopogon cuneatus'' R.Br. (W.A.) - coneflower * '' Isopogon dawsonii'' F.Muell. ex R.T.Baker (N.S.W.) - Nepean cone bush * '' Isopogon divergens'' R.Br. (W.A.) - spreading coneflower * '' Isopogon drummondii'' Hügel ex

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(W.A.) * '' Isopogon dubius'' (R.Br.) Druce (W.A.) - pincushion coneflower * '' Isopogon fletcheri'' F.Muell. (N.S.W.) - Fletcher's drumsticks * '' Isopogon formosus'' R.Br. (W.A.) - rose coneflower ** ''Isopogon formosus'' subsp. ''dasylepis'' (Meisn.) Foreman ** ''Isopogon formosus'' R.Br. subsp. ''formosus'' * '' Isopogon gardneri'' Foreman (W.A.) * '' Isopogon heterophyllus'' Meisn. (W.A.) * '' Isopogon inconspicuus'' (Meisn.) Foreman (W.A.) * '' Isopogon latifolius'' R.Br. (W.A.) * '' Isopogon linearis'' Meisn. (W.A.) * '' Isopogon longifolius'' R.Br. (W.A.) * '' Isopogon mnoraifolius'' McGill. (N.S.W.) * '' Isopogon panduratus'' Hislop &

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(W.A.) ** ''Isopogon panduratus'' subsp. ''palustris'' Hislop & Rye ** ''Isopogon panduratus'' Hislop & Rye subsp. ''panduratus'' * '' Isopogon petiolaris'' R.Br. (Qld., N.S.W.) * '' Isopogon polycephalus'' R.Br. (W.A.) - clustered coneflower * '' Isopogon prostratus'' McGill. (N.S.W., Vic.) - prostrate cone-bush * '' Isopogon pruinosus'' Hislop & Rye (W.A.) ** ''Isopogon pruinosus'' subsp. ''glabellus'' Hislop & Rye ** ''Isopogon pruinosus'' Hislop & Rye subsp. ''pruinosus'' * '' Isopogon robustus'' Foreman ex N.Gibson (W.A.) * '' Isopogon scabriusculus'' Meisn. (W.A.) ** ''Isopogon scabriusculus'' subsp. ''pubifloris'' Foreman ** ''Isopogon scabriusculus'' Meisn. subsp. ''scabriusculus'' ** ''Isopogon scabriusculus'' subsp. ''stenophyllus'' Foreman * '' Isopogon spathulatus'' R.Br. (W.A.) * '' Isopogon sphaerocephalus'' Lindl. (W.A.) - drumstick isopogon * '' Isopogon teretifolius'' R.Br. (W.A.) - nodding coneflower * '' Isopogon tridens'' (Meisn.) F.Muell. (W.A.) - three-toothed coneflower * '' Isopogon trilobus'' R.Br. (W.A.) - barrel coneflower * '' Isopogon uncinatus'' R.Br. (W.A.) * '' Isopogon villosus'' Meisn. (W.A.) Two new species of ''Isopogon'', '' I. autumnalis'' (10 December 2019) and '' I. nutans'' (5 May 2020) have been described but the names have not been accepted by the Australian Plant Census as at November 2020.

References

External links

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q532636 Proteaceae genera Proteales of Australia Endemic flora of Australia