Persoonia rufa



Persoonia rufa is a species of flowering plant in the family Proteaceae and is endemic to the a restricted area of New South Wales. It is an erect to spreading shrub with hairy young branchlets, elliptic leaves, and yellow flowers borne in groups of up to twelve on a rachis up to 110 mm, each flower with a leaf at its base.

Description
Persoonia rufa is an erect to spreading shrub that typically grows to a height of 1–2.5 m and has smooth bark, and branchlets that are covered with brownish to rust-coloured hairs when young. The leaves are elliptical, 30–80 mm long and 10–25 mm wide. The flowers are arranged in groups of up to twelve along a rachis up to 110 mm long, each flower on a pedicel 1–3 mm long with a leaf or scale leaf at its base. The tepals are yellow and 10–14 mm long. Flowering occurs from December to February and the fruit is a drupe that is green or green with purple stripes.

Taxonomy and naming
Persoonia rufa was first formally described in 1991 by Peter H. Weston and Lawrie Johnson from a specimen collected in the Gibraltar Range National Park in 1990 and the description was published in Telopea. The specific epithet (rufa) refers to the reddish hairs on the young branchlets.

Distribution and habitat
This geebung is restricted to the Gibraltar Range National Park where it grows in eucalypt forest on soils derived from granite.