Exocarpos aphyllus
R.Br. Leafless BallartShrub or small tree to c. 5 m high, much-branched, grey-green or olive-green; branchlets terete, stout, rigid, divaricate, striate or sulcate, stellate-hairy at first, becoming glabrous. Leaves alternate, scale-like, ovate, to c. 1 mm long, early caducous. Inflorescences usually 2–10-flowered short, dense, sessile spikes or clusters 2–4 mm long in upper leaf axils; rachis pubescent. Tepals 5, narrow-triangular, to c. 1 mm long, more or less acute, yellow-green, persistent. Fruiting receptacle depressed-obovoid, 1–2 mm long, creamish, becoming red; drupe ovoid, 3–5 mm long, somewhat ribbed, stellate-hairy at first, almost black when ripe. Flowers mostly Jul.–Dec.
LoM, MuM, Wim, VRiv, MSB, RobP, MuF, CVU, NIS. Also WA, SA, Qld, NSW. In Victoria, confined to the north-west, mostly in tall mallee scrub and cypress pine-belah woodlands, on sandy, loamy or calcareous soils and rather uncommon.
Jeanes, J.A. (1999). Exocarpos. In: Walsh, N.G.; Entwisle, T.J., Flora of Victoria Vol. 4, Cornaceae to Asteraceae, pp. 27–29. Inkata Press, Melbourne.
Spinning
