Styphelia cuspidata

Styphelia cuspidata is a species of flowering plant in the family Ericaceae and is endemic to the central Queensland coast. It is a shrub with densely hairy young branchlets, egg-shaped to lance-shaped leaves with the narrower end towards the base, and white, bell-shaped flowers that are bearded inside.

Description
Styphelia cuspidata is a shrub that typically grows to a height of 0.4–1.5 m, its young branchlets densely hairy. The leaves are egg-shaped to lance-shaped with the narrower end towards the base, 10–18 mm long and 2–4 mm wide on a petiole about 0.5 mm long. The leaves point upwards and have a sharply-pointed tip. The flowers are arranged in two to four upper leaf axils on a peduncle up to 1 mm long, with egg-shaped to round bracts about 0.6 mm long and bracteoles 1.0–1.3 mm long. The sepals are lance-shaped, 2.3–3.1 mm long and the petals white and form a bell-shaped tube 1.5–1.9 mm long with lobes 1.8–2.2 mm long and densely hairy inside. Flowering occurs in most months and the fruit is an elliptic drupe 2.8–3.3 mm long.

Taxonomy
This species was first formally described in 1810 by Robert Brown who gave it the name Leucopogon cuspidatus in Prodromus Florae Novae Hollandiae et Insulae Van Diemen. In 1824, Kurt Polycarp Joachim Sprengel transferred the species to Styphelia as S. cuspidata in Systema Vegetabilium. The specific epithet (cuspidata) means "cuspidate".

Distribution and habitat
This leucopogon grows in shrubland on hillsides and mountains on the central Queensland coast between Hook Island in the north and Great Keppel Island and Mount Wheeler in the south.