N.S. Lander, Olearia (Asteraceae: Astereae) 
153 
Distribution. Known from only two localities between 21-23° S and 117-119° E in the Fortescue 
District, Eremaean Botanical Province, Western Australia (Figure 8). 
Habitat. Schistose hills. 
Conservation status. Since it is restricted to two populations a mere 60 km apart, this species 
appears to warrant the category 2V in the coding system of Leigh et al. (1981). 
Other specimens examined, [locality withheld], W.E. Blackall 435 (PERTH); [locality withheld], 
C.A. Gardner 2477 (BM, K, PERTH). 
Etymology. The specific epithet draws attention to the mucronate leaves characteristic of this taxon. 
Notes. The glabrous vegetative parts of plants of this species (apart from the scattered eglandular 
hairs on the leaves and a few glandular hairs on the stereome of the involucral bracts) place it in 
Olearia section Adenotriche Archer ex Benth. 
In the key of Grieve & Blackall (1975) specimens of this species key (with difficulty) to 
0. stuartii (F. Muell.) F. Muell. ex Benth. ( Olearia section Merismotriche). O. mucronata can be 
distinguished from 0. stuartii sens. lat. (see Lander 1989) by its outer involucral bracts, the midribs 
of which are vesicular; by the ray, which comprises 9-12 rather than 21-64 florets; and by the ray 
florets, which are 14.7-15.5 mm long rather than 7-11.5 mm long. 
The ray florets of this species are remarkable for the scattered crystalline deposits in the cells of 
the tube and limb (Figure 5F). To date I have observed such druses elsewhere in Olearia in the 
tubular florets of O.ferresii (F. Muell.) F. Muell. ex Benth. which is placed in section 
Merismotriche , and of O. pimeleoides var. incana D.A. Cooke, which is placed in section Eriotriche 
Archer ex Benth. 
Olearia occidentissima Lander, sp. nov. (Figure 6) 
Species nova ad Oleariam sectionem Eriolrichum pertinens; habitu effuso, foliis petiolatis, 
planis, lanatis, flaccidis, integris, revolutis et floribus radii discique pilis duplicibus distinguitur. 
Typus: Dirk Hartog Island [precise locality withheld], Western Australia, 5 September 1972, 
A.S. George 11568 (holo: PERTH; iso: K, NSW). 
Shrub to 0.2 m high. Vestiture of vegetative surfaces with densely intricate, long, multicellular 
uniseriate, simple eglandular hairs, patent, shorter, multicelluar, uniseriate, simple eglandular hairs 
and multicellular, biscriate, capitate glandular hairs. Stems prostrate (wind-pruned) or erect, white 
and lanate when young, becoming grey and somewhat arachnoid with waxy bark. Leaves alternate, 
scattered, spreading, petiolate; lamina flat, narrowly elliptic, 6-24 x 3-6 mm, discolorous, 
white-lanate abaxially, and grey-green adaxially, smooth; venation indistinct apart from the midrib; 
vestiture lanate abaxially, somewhat arachnoid adaxially; texture flaccid; base narrowly cuneate; 
margin entire, revolute; apex acute, + mucronate. Heads terminal, solitary, subsessile with leaves 
grading into the involucral bracLs, conspicuously radiate, 25-30 mm diameter; disc 15-18 mm 
diameter. Involucre hemispheric; bracts 4-seriate, 4.5-9.0 x 1. 5-2.0 mm. Outer involucral bracts 
narrowly elliptic. Oat; stereome white-lanate abaxially, apically weakly arachnoid adaxially; margin 
entire; apex acute. Inner involucral bracts linear or spathulate, somewhat cymbiform; stereome 
pale green, basally smooth and glabrous but apically densely glandular and with scattered long, 
eglandular hairs abaxially; margin broadly membranous, fimbriate; apex narrowly acute. 
Receptacle somewhat convex. Ray florets 10-12, uniseriate, female, 12-18 mm long; tube white, 
with duplex hairs scattered abaxially; limb obovate, 7.4-1 1.0 x 2.5-3. 5 mm, white or pink, glabrous, 
obtuse and minutely 3-lobed apicaJly; staminodes absent; stylar arms filiform, 2.2-2.4 mm long. 
Disc florets c. 25, bisexual, white (tinged violet), buccinate, 7.5-8.0 mm long, 5-lobcd, with 
