87 



On a New Atriplex from South Australia. 



By J. H. Maiden, Director of the Botanic Gardens, Sydney, 

 Corresponding Member. 



[Read September 7, 1897.] 



Atriplex Kochiana, Maiden. 



A dicecious, occasionally monoecious, erect perennial (or annual 

 with a woody base ?) about one to one and a-half feet high, with 

 very angular branches ; the whole plant grey with a scaly 

 tomentum. Male flowers in terminal interrupted paniculate 

 spikes, leafy at the base ; female flowers in axillary clusters, the 

 upper ones often with a few male flowers. Leaves rather thick, 

 narrowed into a short petiole, ovate-rhomboidal in outline, 

 irregularly sinuate-lobed or almost entire, the largest about one 

 and a-half inches long. Fruiting-perianth nearly sessile, strongly 

 veined as in A. vesicarium, two-lobed to near the base, the 

 segments narrow-reniform, twice as broad as long, almost trun- 

 cate at the top, but slightly denticulate, with two large thick, 

 nearly basal ovate-lanceolate appendages fully twice as long as 

 the calyx-segments. 



It is nearest allied to A. vesicarmm, Hew., which it much 

 resembles in habit and foliage, and from which it is chiefly dis- 

 tinguished by the short and broad segments of the fruiting-calyx, 

 which are scarcely half as long as the dorsal appendages. It is 

 also allied to A. Quinii, F. v. M. (in Victorian Naturalist, 

 November, 1888), but distinguished from that species chiefly by 

 the much longer appendages of the calyx-segments, the broader 

 leaves, and more herbaceous habit. 



Thinly distributed in the vicinity of Mount Distance, near 

 Mount Lyndhurst, via Farina, South Australia. — Heinrich Lud- 

 wig Max Koch, July, 1897. 



Named in honor of Mr. Koch, a very intelligent collector, and 

 transmitted to me by Mr. Albert Molineux, F.L.S., General 

 Secretary of the Agricultural Bureau of South Australia. 



This large-leaved Atriplex is doubtless a valuable fodder plant 

 (it is reported that " it is much liked by stock ") and steps will 

 be taken to have it propagated, with the view to experiments 

 being made in this direction. 



