Line-Leaf Sugarbush
by Eva Lechner
Title
Line-Leaf Sugarbush
Artist
Eva Lechner
Medium
Photograph - Photograph
Description
Leucadendron linifolium is a well branched shrub, 1 - 2 m tall with numerous upright, slender branches. It arises from a single stem, but often gives the appearance of being multi-stemmed because it branches low down and sometimes the bases of the lower branches rest on the ground. Like all leucadendrons, it is dioecious, i.e. the male and female flowers are borne on separate plants. The leaves are small, narrow at the base and broadening towards the tips, with a twist at the base. They vary in length, from 7.5 to 27 mm long in male plants and 15 to 35 mm long in female plants. The leaves spread away from the stem and cover the branches, persisting for a few years (i.e. they are present on the current and previous few years' growth). New growth is usually attractively tinged pinkish red.
Leucadendron linifolium flowers during spring (Sept.-Oct.). Male plants have many small, 10-12 mm wide, yellow flowerheads. They are carried singly at the tips of branches and have a yeasty odour. The female flowerheads are globe-shaped, larger that the male flowerheads, 12-14 mm wide, with a few yellow flowers dotted on the silvery green cone-like flowerhead. They are also borne singly at the tips of branches, and have a faint yeasty odour. After pollination the female flowerheads mature and enlarge to form cones up to23 mm in diameter.
The cones are a light, silvery green, and on some plants, as they mature, they become tinged with red. The fruit is a single-seeded, mottled nutlet, 5mm long, 3.5 mm wide and 3 mm thick, egg-shaped with a pointed tip and covered in shaggy hairs. The seeds ripen several months after flowering but the cones containing them are retained on the plant for years. For the female cones to develop normally both male and female plants must be grown so that fertilisation takes place.
Uploaded
February 9th, 2020
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