BLACK PAPER BARK
Melaleuca lanceolata
Plant Family
Myrtaceae
Alternative Common Names
Dryland tea-tree, Rottnest Island tea-tree, western tea-tree, Moonah, western black tea-tree.
Medium sized shrub or small tree to 7m high, often with a large domed canopy, bark finely cracked, rough grey-brown.
Leaves - alternate, narrow-lanceolate, 5-10mm long, 1-2mm wide, smooth, dull-green, stiff, shortly stalked, often curved downwards.
Flowers - white to cream, intermixed with leaves in an irregular “bottle-brush” spike 2-4cm long, the stamens in bundles of 12 and much longer than the petals.
Fruit - spherical to ovoid capsule, 4-5mm diameter, woody, the individual capsules spaced along the branchlets on the older wood.
Flowering summer.
Habitat
Grows in mallee or open woodland communities on clayey soils; widespread in drier areas.
5, 6