Olearia virgata
Credits
Article from Bean's Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles
Recommended citation
'Olearia virgata' from the website Trees and Shrubs Online (treesandshrubsonline.
Synonyms
- Eurybia virgata Hook. f.
Infraspecifics
Other taxa in genus
- Olearia arborescens
- Olearia argophylla
- Olearia avicenniifolia
- Olearia chathamica
- Olearia cheesemanii
- Olearia colensoi
- Olearia coriacea
- Olearia erubescens
- Olearia frostii
- Olearia furfuracea
- Olearia × haastii
- Olearia ilicifolia
- Olearia ilicifolia × O. moschata
- Olearia insignis
- Olearia lacunosa
- Olearia ledifolia
- Olearia macrodonta
- Olearia × mollis
- Olearia moschata
- Olearia nummulariifolia
- Olearia odorata
- Olearia paniculata
- Olearia phlogopappa
- Olearia ramulosa
- Olearia rotundifolia
- Olearia × scilloniensis
- Olearia semidentata
- Olearia solandri
- Olearia traversii
An evergreen shrub up to 10 or 15 ft high and as much wide, often forming dense tangled bushes; young shoots very slender, wiry, usually four-angled and glabrous. Leaves opposite or in opposite clusters, narrowly obovate, 3⁄16 to 3⁄4 in. long, 1⁄8 to 3⁄8 in. wide, rounded or abruptly narrowed to a point at the apex, tapered at the base, upper surface usually glabrous and dark green, lower surface clothed with white felt; stalk very short or absent. Flower-heads in opposite clusters, each about 1⁄6 in. long and wide and borne on very short downy stalks. Florets in each head five to twelve; ray-florets three to six, yellowish white. Outer scales of the involucre in about three rows, linear-oblong, usually silky-downy. Cheeseman, Ill. New Zealand Fl., t. 91; Salmon, New Zealand Plants and Flowers in Colour, t. 107.
Native of New Zealand in the North and South Islands, from sea-level up to 3,000 ft altitude. This curious shrub has no great beauty and is chiefly interesting for its long, slender, wire-like branches furnished with small leaves and clusters of short flower-heads which open during May and June in this country.
O. virgata and O. odorata are closely related, but the latter has terete branchlets, broader leaves, many more (20 to 25) florets in each head, and the outer scales of the involucre are viscid and glandular. O. virgata itself is a very variable species. Allan in Flora of New Zealand recognises seven named varieties.
var. lineata Kirk
Synonyms
O. lineata (Kirk) Ckn
This variety differs in the more slender and pendulous branchlets, which are often downy when young. Still more does it differ in the opposite leaf-clusters being set farther apart, and in the narrowness of the leaves themselves, which are only {1/24} to {1/16} in. wide, but from {1/2} to 2 in. long. The ray-florets are about twice as many in each head as in the typical state of the species, and number from eight to fourteen. Native of the South Island of New Zealand and of Stewart Island. This variety is more commonly met with in cultivation than the type. There is an example at Wakehurst Place in Sussex about 20 ft high. A plant at Messrs Hilliers’ West Hill Nursery, Winchester, was 27 ft high in 1967.
