Grassland plant diversity

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PDF icon Black Mountain grassland plant diversity

Clustered Everlasting (Chrysocephalum semipapposum) is a clump-forming perennial herb with numerous stems from the base and leaves to 2.5 cm long and 2 mm wide. Bright yellow daisy flower head clusters, to 3.5 cm across, form at the ends of erect stems up to 60 cm high.

Lanky Buttons (Leptorhynchos squamatus subsp. squamatus) is a perennial herb with wiry, shiny red-brown flowering stems to 30 cm high. The leaves are to 3 cm long and 4 mm wide on the lower stem and decrease in size up the stem. The daisy flower heads are bright yellow, and shaped like a cup with flowers drooping over the sides. 

Australian Bindweed (Convolvulus angustissimus subsp. angustissimus) is a perennial herb with a woody rootstock, and trailing, slender stems. Its leaves are to 2.5 cm long and 1 cm wide, and usually have two short lobes towards the base. The pink flowers are broadly funnel‑shaped and up to 2 cm in diameter. 

 

Austral Sunray (Triptilodiscus pygmaeus) is an annual herb less than 10 cm high, with hairy leaves to 20 mm long and 4 mm wide. Each stem ends in a globular, yellow daisy flower head 5-6 mm across.

Curved Riceflower (Pimelea curviflora var. sericea) is a herb-like perennial with hairy stems usually less than 30 cm high. The leaves are 6-15 mm long and less than 5 mm wide, and often slightly hairy. The greenish yellow flowers occur in small heads in the axils of the leaves. Each flower is about 7 mm long, and tubular in shape with four small lobes at the tip.  

Common Everlasting (Chrysocephalum apiculatum) has similar flower heads to Clustered Everlasting but they are to 1.5 cm across on stems to 20 cm high. It has woolly stems and leaves to 4 cm long and 1 cm wide. 

 

Sticky Everlasting (Xerochrysum viscosum) is a short‑lived perennial  herb with erect stems to 50 cm or more high, and leaves to 6 cm long and 5 mm wide. Each stem produces a bright yellow daisy flower head that is surrounded by stiff, papery bracts.

 

Native bluebells (Wahlenbergia species) are slender, erect annual or short-lived perennial herbs with blue flowers made up of 5 or 6 lobes spreading from a short tube. Yellowish Bluebell (Wahlenbergia luteola) and Tall Bluebell (Wahlenbergia stricta) have larger flowers (about 2 cm in diameter) than the other species.

Ngunnawal people ate the flowers of all Bluebell species.

 

Australian Carrot (Daucus glochidiatus) is an erect annual herb usually less than 25 cm tall. Its leaves are divided into segments each about 1-2 mm wide. The flowers and fruits occur on the ends of short stalks arising from the same point (like the rays of an umbrella), in clusters of up to six. The fruits are 3-5 mm long with a row of short bristles along each rib.

 

Wild Flax (Linum marginale) is a slender perennial herb with erect stems to 50 cm tall, and leaves to 20 mm long and 3 mm wide. The pale blue flowers have five petals each to about 1 cm long, and form loose clusters at the ends of the stems.

Ngunnawal people used the stems to make string for fishing lines and nets, and collected and ate the seeds.

 

Woodrush (Luzula densiflora) is a tufted, perennial herb. Its grass-like leaves with densely hairy margins grow mostly from ground level. The flowers occur at the ends of erect stems to 30 cm tall, in small, mostly stalked clusters with one or two leaf‑like bracts. Other small grass-like plants, include sedges and rushes, can be common in the grassland but are easily overlooked.