rubyestephens's Identifications

This was easy to identify as a Monocot. It didn’t take me too long to figure out it was native Iris of some sort which was family Iridaceae, then next came Genus Patersonia. That was the easy part, I spent the last hour figuring out if it is Patersonia sericea or Patersonia glabrata. They are both found in the Robinson book (only four types in the Sydney region) location being in heath and woodland on sandstone within QLD and NSW. Purple flowers 4-6cm long, flowering time Spring, but sericea has stiff spathe covered in short silky hairs whilst glabrata has a still more or less hairless spathe. My second picture you can see silky hairs that’s clue number 1. Second clue are the leaves as sericea are linear, grass like with the length 120-600mm and width of 1-6mm whilst glabrata is 100-400mm long and width of 2-4 mm and minute hairs in the leaf base which I couldn’t find. In the Robinson book the diagram flower of glabrata opens differently to sericea and my flower looks like sericea. This has taken me a lot of back and forwards between these two species to figure out which one and it’s time I commit to sericea.

Family Iridaceae have similarities like grass like leaves, plants grow erect with a sharp central fold. They are perennial plants and have many colours. The Patersonia fits the plant description. Genus Patersonia are native to Australia and Malesia. Flower appears from bract and has three leaves so definitely a moncot. There is three stamens fused as the base to form a tube around a longer style, and a flattened stigma.
Patersonia sericea is endemic to eastern Australia.