Leptinella
Perennial or annual herbs, usually prostrate. Leaves mostly cauline, alternate, entire or toothed to pinnatisect. Capitula broadly cup-shaped or hemispherical, terminal or axillary, solitary, pedunculate; involucral bracts 2–several-seriate, subequal, herbaceous with scarious margins; receptacle flat to conical, naked. Florets on short persistent pedicels or sessile. Outer florets female, tubular, 1–4-seriate; corolla inflated, as wide as ovary at anthesis; style branches linear. Inner florets functionally male, sterile, tubular; corolla narrow-campanulate, 4-lobed, yellow; anthers obtuse or acute at base, with an ovate or lanceolate apical appendage; style terminated by a circular disc. Cypselas subglobose, angular or compressed, often winged, glabrous; pappus absent.
33 species, mostly from New Guinea, Australia, New Zealand and South America; 4 species in Australia, all endemic.
There is uncertainty around the boundaries of Leptinella and Cotula, in particular the assignment of species to these to genera on the basis of corolla presence/absence in female flowers. See note under C. alpina.
Jeanes, J.A. (1999). Asteraceae. In: Walsh, N.G.; Entwisle, T.J., Flora of Victoria Vol. 4, Cornaceae to Asteraceae, pp. 652–666. Inkata Press, Melbourne.
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