Names and synonyms

Macowania pinifolia (N.E. Br.) Kroner
=Athrixia pinifolia N.E.Br.

Type

Evans 59, KwaZulu-Natal, on the Drakensberg, in the bed of Bushman's river (K, NH)

Derivation of names

Macowania = after Dr. Peter MacOwan (1830-1901), botanist, director of the Cape Town Botanic Gardens, and discoverer of new species at the Cape.
Pinus = a coniferous genus; folium = leaf - with leaves like those of pines

Diagnostic characters

Leaves in dense arrangement, terminal on short stems
Capitula solitary on long peduncles

Description

Shrub to 1 m tall, forming dense cushions. Stems bare below, closely leafy towards the tips. Leaves linear, ascending, rather rigid, very acute, up to 30 x 2 mm, broadest  at the base, with glandular hairs on margins, otherwise glabrous, base somewhat clasping eventually leaving circular scars on the twigs. Capitula terminal, solitary, on long slender peduncles, to 60 mm long, peduncles with very dense covering of stalked glandular hairs. Involucre funnel-shaped, c. 10 x 6 mm. Involucral bracts lanceolate, rather abruptly acute or subobtuse, apiculate, somewhat spreading, pale brown, scarious, with an apical membranous limb. Ray florets white, sometimes pink or purplish below. Disc florets yellow. Pappus of c. 12 long delicate bristles, subplumose at the tips, alternating with very short delicate scales. Cypsela 3 mm long, narrowly oblong, pilose, with a basal coma.

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Flowering time

Recorded from July to October.

Distribution

Along the KwaZulu-Natal Drakensberg and in the Lesotho mountains, from Utrecht dist. in the north to Underberg dist. in the south, and thence to Ngeli Mt., and Insikeni in Umzimkulu in the eastern Cape, above c. 1300 m.
Known from about 20 specimens.

Habitat

Found along stream banks.

Notes

A very distinctive species, the solitary heads on long peduncles and leaves crowded at the tips of the branches being unmatched elsewhere in the genus.

References

ANDERBERG, A.A. 1991. Taxonomy and phylogeny of the tribe Gnaphalieae (Asteraceae). Opera Botanica 104: 50-53.
HERMAN, P.P.P.J. 2008. Asteraceae in Strelitzia 14 (2003) and Southern African Botanical Network Report no. 41 (2006): updates and corrections. Bothalia 38: 125-129.
HILLIARD, O.M. & BURTT, B.L. 1976. Notes on some plants of southern Africa chiefly from Natal: V. Notes from the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh 34,3: 260-276.
HILLIARD, O.M. 1977. Compositae in Natal. University of Natal Press.
KESTING, D. & CLARKE, H. 2008. Botanical names, what they mean. Wild Flowers of the Cape Peninsula, 3rd revised edition. Friends of Silvermine.

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