PRICKLY PAPERBARK
Melaleuca stypheliodes
Plant Family
Myrtaceae
Alternative Common Names
prickly-leaved paperbark, prickly leaved teatree.
A small to medium-sized tree up to 20 m high with a dense, rounded canopy and drooping branchlets. Spongy bark of white or light brown and peels off in large strips.
Leaves - have no stalk and are 7–15 mm long and 2.5–6 mm wide. They are slightly twisted, have sharply-pointed tips, are arranged alternately on the branchlets and have between 15 and 30 veins.
Flowers - are cream or white cylindrical "bottlebrush" spikes which are 2 to 5 cm long and 1 to 2 cm in diameter. Often new growth appears at the end of the spikes.
Fruit - grey-brown, woody capsules appear in clusters along the branchlets after flowering. These are ovoid, stalkless and 3 to 4 mm in diameter.
Flowering summer.
Habitat
The species occurs along stream banks or other moist situations.
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