Dwarf she oak | |
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Blue Mountains, Australia | |
Scientific classification | |
Kingdom: | Plantae |
Clade: | Angiosperms |
Clade: | Eudicots |
Clade: | Rosids |
Order: | Fagales |
Family: | Casuarinaceae |
Genus: | Allocasuarina |
Species: | A. nana |
Binomial name | |
Allocasuarina nana (Sieber ex Spreng.) `L.A.S.Johnson |
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Synonyms | |
Casuarina nana |
Casuarina nana
Allocasuarina nana, commonly known as the dwarf she-oak, is a small plant found in eastern Australia. Often seen around one metre tall, it grows in exposed heathlands, ridges, clifftops on sandstone based soils. It is found on the coast and tablelands, south of the Cudgegong River near Mudgee.
The fruiting cones have a mostly smooth and tessellated surface, around 20 mm long and 12 mm wide. Branchlets are very short, less than 8 cm long, the habit is a multi-stemmed spreading low shrub, forming in dense colonies. The specific epithet nana is from Latin, referring to the dwarf size of this small plant.