Revised synonymy for Pultenaea flexilis

Pultenaea flexilis Sm., Annals of Botany (König & Sims) 1(3): 502 (1805)

Pultenaea sweetii G.Don in G. Don (ed.), Hort. brit. 3rd edn, 150 (1839). Type: Australia. Port Jackson, N. S. Wales, 1793, White s.n. (holo: LINN).

Dillwynia teucrioides DC., Prodr. 2: 111 (1825), nom. inval., pro syn.

Dillwynia teucrioides Steud., Nomencl. bot., 2nd edn, 2: 418 (1841), nom. inval., pro syn.

Pultenaea villosa var. glabrescens Benth., Fl. Austral. 2: 135 (1864) syn. nov. Type citation: ‘ Port Jackson, R. Brown. ’ Type: banks of the rivulet ~ 1 mile [~ 1.6 km] above the mill near Parramatta, R. Brown [Bennett No. 5032] (lecto, here designated: K; isolecto: BM 544592 p.p., BM 544593, CANB 278393, MEL 2516691) .

Dillwynia teucrioides Benth., Fl. Austral. 2: 135 (1864), nom. inval., pro syn.

Notes

Material at BM (BM 000544616), annotated by F. A. W. Sieber as his unpublished ‘ Dillwynia teucrioides ’ is mixed, comprising two separate shoots, one of P. mutabilis var. mutabilis, the other of P. flexilis . These plants were evidently both gathered at Mount Wilson, which is likely, given the two species are today known to co-occur at nearby Bilpin.

Bentham cites only Brown’s gathering in the protologue of P. villosa var. glabrescens, which is taken as a reference to all the included specimens derived from that gathering (Art. 9.6), which are held at several herbaria. We designate the specimen from Brown’s herbarium in K as the lectotype, to preserve the current type citation and reflect Bentham’s locus labori. The lectotype bears Brown’s original label, reading ‘ Rivulet near Gin’, gin being a little dam with a water wheel and mill in Highland parlance. This specimen comprises four shoots from possibly two different sources, as the specimen also has Bennett’s label (John Bennett was a compiler of the public set from derived from Brown’s herbarium).

The type of P. villosa var. glabrescens is a short-leaved morphotype of P. flexilis . One other specimen held by NSW from the Cumberland Plain and Georges River also has the same short leaves. The status of these plants and their relationships with the typical morphotype of P. flexilis warrants further investigation.