Pultenaea villosa



Pultenaea villosa, commonly known as hairy bush-pea, is a species of flowering plant in the family Fabaceae and is endemic to eastern Australia. It is a shrub with softly-hairy foliage, narrow elliptic to linear, oblong to club-shaped leaves, and yellow-orange and reddish-brown, pea-like flowers.

Description
Pultenaea villosa is an erect, sometimes prostrate shrub, that typically grows to 0.25–2.5 m high and 3 m wide, with softly-hairy foliage and sometimes with weeping branches. The leaves are arranged alternately, narrow elliptic to linear, oblong to club-shaped, mostly 3–10 mm long and 1.5–3.0 mm wide with stipules 1–4 mm long pressed against the stem at the base. The flowers are 5–12 mm long, arranged in small groups near the ends of branches, each flower on a pedicel 1–4 mm long. The sepals are 3.5–11 mm long with bracteoles 3.4–5.3 mm long usually attached to the sepal tube. The standard petal is yellow to orange with reddish brown lines and 8.2–10.3 mm long, the wings yellow to orange and 8.2–9.2 mm long, and the keel reddish-brown and 7.6–8.7 mm long. Flowering mainly occurs from August to November and the fruit is an inflated pod 5–6 mm long.

Taxonomy
Pultenaea villosa was first formally described in 1799 by Carl Ludwig Willdenow in the fourth edition of the Species Plantarum. The specific epithet (villosa) means "with long, soft hairs".

Distribution and habitat
Hairy bush-pea grows in forest, heathland grassland and coastal dunes in south-east Queensland and on the coast and Northern Tablelands of New South Wales.

Use in horticulture
This "eggs and bacon" pea is one of the easier pultenaeas to grow in the garden. It can be propagated from seed or from cuttings and grown as a specimen plant or in informal hedges, preferring moist soil in a partly sunny position. The species is frost hardy and has "attractive" reddish new growth.