Cuttsia viburnea

Cuttsia
Cuttsia viburnea
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
(unranked):	Angiosperms
(unranked):	Eudicots
(unranked):	Asterids
Order:	Asterales
Family:	Rousseaceae
Genus:	Cuttsia F.Muell.
Species:	C. viburnea
Binomial name
Cuttsia viburnea F.Muell.

Cuttsia viburnea is a shrub or bushy tree which has toothed leaves and panicles of white flowers, and that is endemic to eastern Australia. It is sometimes called silver-leaved cuttsia, and confusingly also native elderberry, honey bush or native hydrangea (because these names are also used for other native Australian species).C. viburnea is the only species assigned to the genus Cuttsia.

The silver-leaved cuttsia is a shrub or bushy tree of up to 15 m high. Its branchlets however are inially herbaceous and have conspicuous lenticels. Young shoots and inflorescences have hairs that are flat against the surface. Leaves are alternately arranged along the stems. The leaf stem is 1½-4½ cm long. The leaf blades are hairless, soft and thin in texture, bright green and shiny above with a paler underside, oval with the widest point at or beyond midlength, 8–20 × 2–6½ cm. Its foot gradually narrows into the leaf stem, the edge is uniformly toothed and each tooth ends in a gland, and its tip is pointed. The secondary veins emerge at about 45° from the main vein and strongly curve, with their ends parallel to the edge of the leaf.

The inflorescence is a multi-flowered panicle of 8–18 cm long. The symmetrical star-shaped flowers are pentamerous and pleasantly honey scented. The five triangular green sepals are less than 1 mm long. The five free white petals are long inverted tear-shaped 3–4 mm long and have a pointy tip. The five narrow white filaments alternate with the petals and are topped with anthers shorter than the filament, that shed cream-colored pollen. Pollen is tricolpate, triangular from a polar perspective and round from an equatorial perspectieve, about 20 μm, has a netted surface structure and is not shed in clusters of four but individually (microscope). On top of the yellowish disc sits a narrow white style that has a stigma with five lobes. Flowers can be found from October to December. The fruit is a green to light brown globose to ovoid capsule of 3–4 mm long, each locule of which opens separately. Seeds are minute and ovoid in shape.

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Wikipedia