#waitzia

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#3173 - Waitzia acuminata - Orange Immortelle

Acuminata is latin for 'tapered to a point'

A very common annual paper daisy in the SW corner of Australia, but sparse in the drier parts of other states. It usually grows in open, hot environments with deep sandy red soils or shallow stony soils (sandstone and granite) amongst mallee and mulgoa woodlands. But also in saline depressions, sand, loam, gravel, litter, laterite, sand dunes, plains, and clay soils. Since Wongan has all of those, it's hardly surprising we found the plant growing everywhere.

GSB2024 Wongan Hills

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#3628 - Waitzia suaveolens var. suaveolens - Fragrant Waitzia

A lot of the photos from this day trip to Whiteman Park aren't very good, largely because it was so scorchingly hot the phone kept overheating, and so bright I could barely make out the screen even when i could actually take a photo. Still, the glow around this one is visually interesting, at least.

It was first described in 1837 and named Leptorhynchus suaveolens by English botanist George Bentham. The binomial honours Karl Friedrich Waitz (1774–1848), a privy councillor of the Duchy of Saxe-Altenburg, and uses the Latin for "sweet-smelling".

Both varieties of Fragrant Waitzia are endemic to the SW of Australia, and grow to about 60cm in height. It grows in deep sandy soils, or more shallow ones overlying granite or ironstone, and the outer bracts may be pink or deep burgundy.

Whiteman Park, Perth.

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#3174 - Waitzia acuminata var. albicans

This form of the Orange Immortelle turns from pink to white.

GSB2024 Wongan Hills - Christmas Rock

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#3172 - Waitzia nitida

Photo by Chris Punter.

The genus was first formally described in 1845 by German botanist Joachim Steetz, and named after Karl Friedrich Waitz (1774-1848), a privy councillor of the Duchy of Saxe-Altenburg and amateur botanist.

Yet another paper daisy endemic to the Western Wheatbelt. It's already a very large Tribe, but the sheer variety of near-identical paper daisies around Wongan Hills did get a bit confusing.

An annual, growing from 5-35cm high, with fragrant flowers from August to November. It prefers red sand, and gravelly soils. Given the very wide variety of soil types around Wongan, from greenschist to clay, it has no shortage of options. The complex geology is a major factor in the sheer diversity of plant species in the area, in fact.

GSB2024 Wongan Hills.