| Genus Acrotriche | Family Ericaceae
Subfamily Epacridoideae |
Description: Small shrubs; branchlets finely pubescent to hirsute.
Leaves crowded, usually linear, lanceolate or oblong, discolorous, the lower surface dull or glaucous and shallowly or deeply striate-veined, and usually with a pungent tip; petiole short.
Flowers small, in sessile or shortly pedunculate spikes, axillary or on the old wood below the leaves; each flower subtended by 1 bract and 2 bracteoles. Sepals 5, ovate to ± circular, obtuse and glabrous except for ciliolate margins. Corolla tube campanulate to cylindrical, often somewhat inflated, with 5 tufts of hairs spreading across the throat; lobes valvate in bud, spreading in open flower, each with an erect tuft of hairs near the tip. Stamens with short filaments inserted at the throat; anthers half to fully exserted, obvious below the lobes outside. Nectary annular. Ovary globose, usually 2–7-locular with 1 ovule per loculus; style short, not exserted; stigma lobed.
Fruit usually flat-topped.
Distribution and occurrence: World: 14 species, endemic Australia. Australia: all States except N.T.
Text by J. M. Powell, except for groups with contributors listed
Taxon concept:
Taxa not yet included in identification key
Acrotriche leucocarpa
| | Key to the species | |
| 1 | Leaves convex, margins strongly recurved | Acrotriche rigida |
| Leaves flat or nearly so, margins not recurved | 2 |
| 2 | Leaves less than 2 mm wide, lanceolate to almost linear, thin, shallowly grooved between the veins, usually with scattered long hairs | Acrotriche serrulata |
| Leaves usually more than 2 mm wide, ovate, oblong or elliptic, thicker, lacking grooves between the veins, usually glabrous
Back to 1 | 3 |
| 3 | Leaves usually elliptic to obovate, sometimes more oblong or ovate, lower surface whitish with wax-covered papillae; flowers in clusters of 5–10; bracteoles 1–1.2 mm long; fruit depressed-globose, flat-topped, more than 3.5 mm diam | Acrotriche aggregata |
| Leaves usually lanceolate but sometimes oblong- elliptic to elliptic, lower surface usually dull and lacking papillae; flowers in clusters of 3–5; bracteoles 0.5–0.9 mm long; fruit more or less globose, less than 3.5 mm diam
Back to 2 | Acrotriche divaricata |
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