Coast Bonefruit

Coast Bonefruit photos

Family: Saltbush (Chenopodiaceae)

Scientific Name:

Threlkeldia diffusa

Plant of Coast Bonefruit
Photo: A J Brown

Other Common Name:

Wallaby Saltbush

Status:

Native to Western Australia, South Australia, Tasmania and Victoria.

Plant Description:

Prostrate to sprawling perennial shrub with narrow oblanceolate and sometimes glaucous (whitish bloom) leaves from 5-15 mm long. Flowers solitary in the axils between leaf and stem and consist of a fleshy, tubular perianth of three indistinct lobes and 3 stamens. Fruit are cyclindrical to urn-shaped, 2.5-3.5 mm long and woody within.

Habitat:

Scattered along coastal dunes, cliffs and the edges of tidal saltmarshes. Rare around salt-pans in far north-west Victoria.

Region	Salinity Class	Waterlogging Class
Mallee, Western, Gippsland	S1, S2, S3	W0, W1, W2, W3

*coastal only

Comments:

Superficial appearance to Austral Seablite but differs in its shorter leaves and hardened fruit. Closely related to Bonefruit (Osteocarpum acropterum) from the Mallee Region but differs in its fruit being thinly succulent rather than dry and more elongated than the subglobular shape of Bonefruit fruit.

Coast Bonefruit Photos

Leaves of Coast Bonefruit Photo: A J Brown		Leaves and developing fruit (top left corner) of Coast Bonefruit Photo: A J Brown

Sprawling habit of Coast Bonefruit Photo: A J Brown

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