Quoya paniculata facts for kids

Quoya paniculata is a pretty flowering plant. It belongs to the mint family, which is called Lamiaceae. This plant grows only in Western Australia. It is a shrub with branches and leaves covered in soft, woolly hairs. Its flowers are usually bell-shaped and are a deep purple or lilac color. They often grow in small groups. This plant looks a bit like Dasymalla axillaris and D. terminalis. However, you can tell Quoya paniculata apart by its wedge-shaped leaf ends. It also grows further north than those other plants.

About the Quoya Plant

Quoya paniculata is a plant that stands upright. It can grow up to about 1.0 m (3 ft) tall. Its branches are covered with thick, woolly, greenish-white hairs. The leaves grow in pairs, one opposite the other. They are shaped like an oval or a spear, with ends that look like a wedge. These leaves are 30–60 mm (1–2 in) long and 6–15 mm (0.2–0.6 in) wide. They are also covered in woolly hairs.

The flowers grow in groups of up to five. These groups can be 50–150 mm (2–6 in) long. Each flower sits on a small, hairy stalk called a pedicel, which is 2–5 mm (0.08–0.2 in) long. The flowers are surrounded by special leaves called bracts and bracteoles. These are woolly on the outside but mostly smooth on the inside.

The flower has five deep purple-lilac sepals. These are the leaf-like parts that protect the bud. They are hairy on the outside and joined at their bases. The five petals are also deep lilac. They are joined together to form a bell-shaped tube. This tube has two "lips" at the end. The top lip has two small parts, called lobes. The bottom lip has three lobes. The middle lobe of the bottom lip is about twice as big as the other four. Inside the flower, there are four stamens. These are the parts that produce pollen. They are about the same length as the flower tube. This plant usually flowers from May to December. After flowering, it produces hairy, almost round fruits with the sepals still attached.

Plant Names and History

The plant Quoya paniculata was first officially described in 1864. This was done by a scientist named Ferdinand von Mueller. He wrote about it in a book called Fragmenta phytographiae Australiae. The plant he studied was found by Maitland Brown near Shark Bay. The second part of its name, paniculata, is a Latin word. It means "paniculate", which describes how the flowers are arranged in groups.

Later, in 1870, another scientist named George Bentham changed the plant's name to Pityrodia paniculata. But in 2011, three scientists, Barry Conn, Murray Henwood, and Nikola Streiber, changed the name back to Q. paniculata. Scientists sometimes change plant names when they learn more about how different plants are related.

Where the Quoya Plant Grows

This quoya plant grows in sandy and gravelly soils. You can find it mainly on flat, sandy areas called sandplains. It grows mostly between the towns of Geraldton and Karratha in Western Australia. It is found in several different natural areas, including the Carnarvon, Dampierland, Gascoyne, Murchison, and Pilbara regions.

Protecting the Quoya Plant

The Western Australian Government's Department of Parks and Wildlife has looked at Quoya paniculata. They have classified it as "not threatened." This means that there are enough of these plants in the wild, and they are not currently at risk of disappearing.