Olearia

Olearia
Olearia stuartii
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae
(unranked): Angiosperms
(unranked): Eudicots
(unranked): Asterids
Order: Asterales
Family: Asteraceae
Tribe: Astereae
Genus: Olearia
Moench
Type species
Olearia tomentosa
(J.C.Wendl.) DC
Species

See text.

Olearia is a genus of flowering plants belonging to the family Asteraceae. There are about 130 different species within the genus found mostly in Australia, New Guinea and New Zealand. The genus includes herbaceous plants, shrubs and small trees. The latter are unusual among the Asteraceae and are called tree daisies in New Zealand. All bear the familiar daisy-like composite flowerheads.

The genus is named after Johann Gottfried Olearius, a 17th-century German scholar and author of Specimen Florae Hallensis.[1] Originally a large genus, a molecular study has found it to be polyphyletic.[2]

Olearia species are used as food plants by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species including Aenetus ligniveren, which burrows into the trunk.

Species

Selected species:

References

  1. ↑ Moench, Conrad. 1802. Supplementum ad Methodum Plantas. pp. 254-255
  2. ↑ Cross, E.W.; Quinn, C.J.; Wagstaff, S.J. (2002). "Molecular evidence for the polyphyly of Olearia (Astereae: Asteraceae)". Plant Systematics and Evolution. 235 (1-4): 99–120. JSTOR 23645039.
  3. 1 2 3 WIlson, Paul G. "Search terms: olearia". New South Wales Flora Online. National Herbarium of New South Wales.


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