Brachyglottis
Credits
Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles
Recommended citation
'Brachyglottis' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
Family
- Asteraceae
Species in genus
- Brachyglottis bidwillii
- Brachyglottis buchananii
- Brachyglottis compacta
- Brachyglottis Dunedin hybrids
- Brachyglottis elaeagnifolia
- Brachyglottis greyi
- Brachyglottis hectorii
- Brachyglottis huntii
- Brachyglottis huntii × B. Dunedin Hybrids
- Brachyglottis laxifolia
- Brachyglottis monroi
- Brachyglottis perdicioides
- Brachyglottis perdicioides × B. Dunedin Hybrids
- Brachyglottis repanda
- Brachyglottis rotundifolia
Editorial Note
This entry has been heavily adapted from Bean (1981) to update the taxonomy, revisions already outlined by C. Jeffrey in Bean (1988).
Species treated here belong to the endemic New Zealand (and Chatham Island) genus Brachyglottis, transferred from Senecio by Nordenstam (1978). (See also Urostemon, another New Zealand genus previously included in Senecio.)
Shrubs or small trees with alternate leaves and the composite inflorescences characteristic of the Asteraceae, consisting of numerous flowers (or ‘florets’ as they are usually called) crowded in ‘heads’. The florets are usually of two kinds: those in the centre of the head, of tubular shape and known as ‘disk’ florets; and those of the circumference, tongue-shaped, radiating, and known as ‘ray’ florets. (The daisy is the most familiar type.) But sometimes the florets are wholly discoid, as in B. elaeagnifolia and B. rotundifolia var. rotundifolia.
Hybridisation amongst the New Zealand species is widespread, both in cultivation and in the wild, and the majority of plants in cultivation in the British Isles are of hybrid origin. Failure to recognise this has in the past caused much misidentification of cultivated material. Fortunately D. G. Drury, in New Zeal. Journ. Bot., Vol. 11, pp. 731–784 (1973) has provided us with a reliable key to the New Zealand shrubby ‘senecios’ and their hybrids, both cultivated and wild. His account gives full descriptions and illustrations of all the known hybrids, and the reader is referred to it for a fuller treatment. Most of the hybrids recorded as in cultivation in New Zealand have yet to be confirmed as in cultivation in the British Isles; some may eventually prove to be of garden merit.
Provided the climate is sufficiently mild for them, the senecios are of easy cultivation and succeed well in a light or sandy soil. B. compacta, B. greyi, B. laxifolia and the cultivated Dunedin hybrids succeed on lime or chalk, as probably do most of the others. The senecios are not sufficiently planted in sea-side gardens, for which places the toughness of the leathery leaves admirably fits them. Propagation is effected by late summer cuttings placed in very sandy soil and given if possible a mild bottom heat. (See Olearia for the distinction between that genus and Senecio.)
