Daviesia mimosoides Brown (1811: 20)

Crisp, Michael D., Cayzer, Lindy, Chandler, Gregory T. & Cook, Lyn G., 2017, A monograph of Daviesia (Mirbelieae, Faboideae, Fabaceae), Phytotaxa 300 (1), pp. 448-450 : 448-450

48. Daviesia mimosoides Brown (1811: 20) , Thompson (1961: 35), Stanley & Ross (1983: 253), Crisp (1991a: 271), Crisp (1995: 1213), Jeanes (1996: 759), Crisp (2002: 524). Daviesia glauca Loddiges (1817 : t. 43), nom. superfl. & illeg. ( D. mimosoides is given as a synonym). Daviesia laurifolia Link (1821: 403) , nom. superfl. & illeg. (given as a synonym of D. glauca ). Daviesia corymbosa Smith (1805: 507) var. mimosoides (R.Br.) Bentham (1864: 77) . Type: ‘Nat. of New South Wales. Robert Brown, Esq. Introd. 1809, by Thomas Gibbs.’ Lectotype ( Crisp 1991a: 271): Port Jackson, between Green Hills and Parramatta, R. Brown s.n., 1802–5 (BM—sheet with printed blue label, annotated by MDC as ‘holotype’ on 15 Jan 1982); isolectotype: BM (sheet annotated by Crisp as ‘?isotype’), E, K, MEL, NSW

[ Daviesia corymbosa auct . non Sm.: Mueller (1888: 203), Moore & Betche (1893: 133)]

Usually multi-stemmed, open-crowned shrubs, (0.5–) 1–2 m tall, rarely arborescent, to 5 m, glabrous. Root anatomy unknown. Branchlets ascending to effuse, angular-terete. Phyllodes scattered, erect, spreading or rarely reflexed, most commonly narrowly elliptic, less often linear, obovate or narrowly so, acute to rarely rounded at the apex, flat or rarely undulate, entire or rarely crenulate, tapered or rarely cuneate at the articulate base, 15–200 × 4– 30 mm, penninerved, with venation slightly raised or obscure, coriaceous to rather thin, dull and mostly pale green to glaucescent. Unit inflorescences 1 or 2 (3) per axil, racemose, 5–10-flowered, usually corymbiform; peduncle 1– 5 mm long; rachis (2–) 4–12 mm long; bracts usually well spaced, rarely imbricate; subtending bracts appressed to pedicels, narrowly oblong, with strongly incurved margins, 0.75–2 mm long. Pedicels 1–9 mm long. Calyx 2.5–5 mm long including the 1–2 mm receptacle to which it is constricted at the base; upper 2 lobes united in a truncate or obtuse, entire or scarcely emarginate lip, 0.4–1.2 mm long, rarely more deeply divided; lower 3 lobes equal, shallowly to very shallowly triangular, thickened and tinged with dark red-brown at the apex, 0.3–0.6 mm long. Corolla : standard transversely broadly elliptic or very broadly ovate, obcordate, broadly cuneate to slightly cordate at the base, 6–7.5 × 5.5–8 mm including the 1–2 mm claw, (orange-) yellow with dark brownish-red or maroon infusion towards the centre and a central intense yellow bilobed marking; wings obovate, oblong or narrowly so, rounded and incurved at the apex, auriculate, 5–6.75 × 1.75–2.75 mm including the 1.5–2 mm claw, dark brownish-red or maroon grading to yellow at the apex and margins; keel half very broadly obovate to depressed-obovate, ± acute, auriculate, slightly saccate, 4–4.5 × 1.5–2 mm including the 1.5–1.75 mm claw, maroon; dark red markings rarely almost absent from petals. Stamens strongly dimorphic: inner whorl of 5 with terete filaments and round, ± versatile, anthers with confluent thecae; outer whorl of 5 with compressed filaments and compressed obloid, basifixed, 2-celled anthers; filaments free. Pod obliquely shallowly to very broadly obtriangular, obtuse to broadly

A MONOGRAPH OF DAVIESIA

Phytotaxa 300 (1) © 2017 Magnolia Press • 113 acute, strongly compressed, 6–10 × 4–7 mm, dull red when immature, straw-coloured when ripe, rarely lead-grey; upper suture sigmoid; lower suture acute. Seed compressed ellipsoid, 2.5–3 mm long, 1.5–2 mm broad, 1 mm thick, brown with black mottling; aril obloid, with a thickly ridged lobe, 1–2 mm long. ( Fig. 47 , 48 ).

Chromosome number:— n = 9, 2n = 18 ( Sands 1975).

Common name:— Leafy Bitter-pea.

Flowering period:— Mainly September and October but commencing as early as August on the coast and finishing as late as December at high elevations in the south. Fruiting period: October to January, the period also varying with elevation and latitude.

Distribution:— Extending patchily from near Maroochydore on the Sunshine Coast of Queensland, southward through the coast and tablelands of New South Wales to the eastern highlands of Victoria, as far west as Mt Tamboritha (in the highlands east of Melbourne). Isolated populations occur on the plains on the inland side of the Great Dividing Range near Mulwala on the Murray River in New South Wales and between the Broken and Ovens Rivers in Victoria. Records from farther east are likely to be misidentifications of either D. leptophylla or D. laevis .

Habitat:— This widespread and variable species occupies a variety of habitats. The elevation range is from sea level to nearly 1500 m and the mean annual precipitation varies from 500 to> 1500 mm. The soils are usually light or skeletal and acidic. The vegetation is most commonly open forest dominated by various Eucalyptus spp. with an understorey of sclerophyll shrubs. Near to the coast and on high mountains, it occurs in heath. Daviesia mimosoides is an extremely common shrub in the Southern Tablelands of New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory, so much so that it dominates much of the understorey of the montane forests. Plants regenerate freely from seed after fire.

Affinity:— Daviesia mimosoides is closely related to D. arborea , D. buxifolia , D. corymbosa , D. discolor , D. elliptica , D. laxiflora , D. laevis , D. leptophylla and D. suaveolens ( Fig. 1A ). All these species have leaf-like phyllodes and more or less racemose inflorescences and occur in eastern Australia.

Previously, D. mimosoides was either confused with D. corymbosa or placed as a variety under that species ( Thompson 1961). In fact, D. corymbosa is not very closely related to D. mimosoides ( Fig. 1A ) and can be readily distinguished by its inflorescence, bracts and leaf venation. The inflorescence of D. corymbosa is strongly corymbose, sometimes umbelliform, with the pedicels crowded along the upper few millimetres of the rachis. Below the lowest pedicel, the rachis usually has a naked central portion and below this again barren bracts are scattered down to the base. The rachis is mostly longer (10–40 mm) and more robust than in D. mimosoides . The bracts spread or reflex from the rachis and are broader than in D. mimosoides , being broadly elliptic in shape. The phyllode venation of D. corymbosa is prominently raised and reticulate, by contrast with the less conspicuous, pinnate venation of D. mimosoides .

Daviesia suaveolens is very similar to D. mimosoides but differs in having strongly fragrant, mostly pure yellow flowers and longer (ca. 1 mm long), narrower calyx lobes which are uniform in thickness and usually uniform in colour. In D. leptophylla , the phyllodes have at least 2 raised longitudinal veins and slightly recurved margins, and are nearly always linear.

Both D. buxifolia and D. elliptica differ from D. mimosoides in having phyllodes with crenulate margins (sometimes obscurely so) and a glossy green surface, and the base of the phyllode is cordate, rounded or cuneate; also the peduncles are usually longer in these 2 species (3.5–15 mm long). Intermediates between D. mimosoides and D. buxifolia or D. elliptica have been recorded in a few places (see the section on hybrids at the end of Crisp 1991a). Daviesia arborea and D. discolor both differ from D. mimosoides in their thin, parallel-veined, discolorous phyllodes and in their calyx lobes which are uniform in thickness and colour. Daviesia laevis and D. laxiflora differ from D. mimosoides in having inflorescences that are long and evenly racemose from the base; in D. laevis the rachis is 20–30(–80) mm long and in D. laxiflora it is 50–100 mm long.

Hybrids:— Daviesia buxifolia × D. mimosoides , D. elliptica × D. mimosoides , D. elliptica × D. latifolia × D. mimosoides , D. latifolia × D. mimosoides , D. leptophylla × D. mimosoides . Hybrids between D. leptophylla and D. mimosoides occur on the Southern Tablelands of New South Wales where the species come into contact ( Crisp 1991a).

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Figures

FIGURE 1A. Phylogeny (part) of Daviesia estimated using maximum likelihood (PHYML) from concatenated sequences of ITS (nrDNA), and ndhF and trnL–trnF (cpDNA). The tree was rooted using the monotypic sister groups Viminaria and Erichsenia (not shown). The informal clade names are used for reference in the taxonomic treatment. Numbers on branches show non-bootstrap support. The tips are labelled with the taxon name and sample accession number.

FIGURE 47. Daviesia mimosoides subsp. mimosoides. A. Flowering branchlet. B. Inflorescence. C. Flower with subtending bract. D. Calyx opened out, upper lip at left. E. Standard. F. Wings. G. Keel. H. Same, opened out. I. Pod. A–H from Crisp 6795; I from Evans & Blaxell s.n. (NSW 46156). Drawn by A.L. Prowse and D. Fortescue. Adapted from Crisp (1991a) with permission from CSIRO Publishing.

FIGURE 48. Daviesia mimosoides, comparing phyllode variation in the two subspecies. A–C. Daviesia mimosoides subsp. mimosoides (A, B from Brown s.n., 1802–5, holotype, BM; C from Crisp 1329). D, E. Daviesia mimosoides subsp. acris (D from Beauglehole 35741; E from Crisp 1910). Drawn by A.L. Prowse. Adapted from Crisp (1991a) with permission from CSIRO Publishing.