''Banksia heliantha'', commonly known as oak-leaved dryandra, is a species of shrub that is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

to Western Australia. It has hairy stems, serrated, egg-shaped to wedge-shaped leaves, golden yellow flowers and partly woolly follicles.

Description

''Banksia heliantha'' is a robust, openly-branched shrub that typically grows to a height of and has hairy stems but does not form a lignotuber. The leaves are wedge-shaped to egg-shaped with the narrower end towards the base, long and wide on a petiole up to long. The leaves have between five and fifteen sharply-pointed teeth up to long on each side. The flowers are borne in groups of between 140 and 160 in a head on the ends of branches with hairy, tapering linear involucral bracts up to long at the base of the head. The flowers have a golden yellow

perianth The perianth (perigonium, perigon or perigone in monocots) is the non-reproductive part of the flower. It is a structure that forms an envelope surrounding the sexual organs, consisting of the calyx (sepals) and the corolla (petals) or tepal ...

is long that is hairy at its base and a yellow pistil long and glabrous. Flowering occurs in March or from July to October and the follicles are egg-shaped, long and woolly in the upper half. Up to fifteen follicle form in each head.

Taxonomy and naming

The oak-leaved dryandra was first formally described in 1856 by Carl Meissner who gave it the name ''Dryandra quercifolia'' and published the description in de Candolle's '' Prodromus Systematis Naturalis Regni Vegetabilis'' from specimens collected by James Drummond. The

specific epithet In Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin gramm ...

(''quercifolia'') is a Latin word meaning "oak-leaved". In 2007, Austin Mast and Kevin Thiele transferred all the ''Dryandra'' species to '' Banksia'' but there was already a different species known as '' Banksia quercifolia'', so the name of this dryandra was changed to ''Banksia heliantha''. The epithet (''heliantha'') is from

ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

, meaning "sun-flowered".

Distribution and habitat

''Banksia heliantha'' grows in dense kwongan on rocky hills near the south coast of Western Australia between the Gairdner River and East Mount Barren, and inland as far as the ranges north of Ravensthorpe, in the Esperance Plains and Mallee biogeographic regions.

Conservation status

This banksia is classified as "not threatened" by the Government of Western Australia Department of Parks and Wildlife.

References

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q4856616 heliantha Endemic flora of Western Australia Plants described in 1856 Taxa named by Kevin Thiele