Pityrodia | |
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Pityrodia augustensis | |
Scientific classification | |
Kingdom: | Plantae |
Clade: | Tracheophytes |
Clade: | Angiosperms |
Clade: | Eudicots |
Clade: | Asterids |
Order: | Lamiales |
Family: | Lamiaceae |
Subfamily: | Prostantheroideae |
Genus: |
Pityrodia R.Br. [1] |
Species | |
See text | |
Synonyms | |
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Pityrodia is a genus of flowering plants in the mint family, Lamiaceae and is endemic to Australia, most species occurring in Western Australia, a few in the Northern Territory and one in Queensland. Plants in this genus are shrubs with five petals joined to form a tube-shaped flower with four stamens of unequal lengths.
Plants in the genus Pityrodia are evergreen shrubs with erect, usually cylindrical branches. The leaves are simple, net-veined and their bases partly wrap around the stem ( decurrent). The flowers may occur singly or in groups and exhibit left-right symmetry. There are 5 sepals which are joined at their bases and 5 petals joined to form a tube. The tube may have 5, unequally sized lobes at the tip or two "lips" - the upper lip having two lobes and the lower one three. There are four stamens with one pair longer than the other. The fruit is a drupe containing up to four seeds. [2] [3]
The genus was first described by Robert Brown in 1810. Brown published his description in Prodromus Florae Novae Hollandiae and designated Pityrodia salvifolia as the type species. [1] [4] The name Pityrodia is an Ancient Greek word meaning "scale-like". [5]
Pityrodia was originally included in the Verbenaceae. In a review of the genus in 1979, Ahmad Abid Munir included Pityrodia and nine other genera in a family Chloanthaceae, all endemic to Australia and sometimes referred to as "Australian Verbenaceae". [2] The name Chloanthaceae has not been widely adopted and Pityrodia is now included in the Lamiaceae. [6]
In his 1979 paper, Munir described 27 species from Western Australia, 16 from the Northern Territory and one from Queensland, [2] but in 2011, Barry Conn, Murray Henwood and Nicola Streiber transferred some species to Dasymalla, Hemiphora and Quoya and raised a new genus Muniria to which four species of the former Pityrodia were transferred. [7] A new species from Western Australia, ( Pityrodia iphthima) has since been described. [6]
The following is a list of Pityrodia species accepted by the Australian Plant Census as at February 2023: [8]