Coastal Tea-tree
Young Flower
Coastal Tea-tree
Older Flower
| Coastal Tea-tree Young Flower | | Coastal Tea-tree Older Flower | | ||
 | Class: | Plants (Plantae) - Land Plants (Charophyta) - Land Plants (Equisetopsida) | |||
| Order: | Myrtles (Myrtales) | ||||
| Family: | Myrtle (Myrtaceae) iNaturalist Observation | ||||
| Species: | Coastal Tea-tree (Leptospermum laevigatum) | ||||
| This Photo: | 🔍Flower🔎 | ||||
| Synonym: | Gaudium laevigatum | ||||
| Other name: | Australian Tea-tree | ||||
Thank you Reiner Richter for confirming the id of this species for us General Species Information: Seen in Coastal Areas Notice the flowers get a red ring around the centre as they age. We use the large leaves, compared to flower size, to separate from Mallee Tea-tree (Leptospermum coriaceum). Thanks to Dr Kym Nicolson who replied to our query about it's Introduced status; he said "It is not a definitive answer and I'm not sure you will ever get one, but the ALA includes most Australian Herbarium records and the first record of Leptospermum laevigatum in SA appears to be in 1906 from Granite Island. I would have thought it unlikely that a species such as this would have gone un-noticed/uncollected for 70 years after SA settlement." We then check the SA Biological Database, which showed the same results. Only 10 records exist up to 1956. This is pretty conclusive that it wasn't here before European settlement, and so introduced from the Eastern States. It's important to note that the SA Herberium considers it locally introduced as well. Dan Clarke from the Australian Native Plant Society kindly pointed us to the PIRSA web site that shows it's a Declared Weed in SA. | |||||
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