#actinobole

Wooo took a bit of a break from posting microscopy so I could finish off my demonstrating and field work for the year! BUT we're back at it, and this week features Actinobole uliginosum!

This plant is so tiny, only a few cm high (so-called inchflora), that you’d need to be on your hands and knees in the dirt to really notice it exists. It’s an Asteraceae with cottony leaves and white-creamy coloured flowers. In Victoria you can find them in shrublands and dry forests in the west.

Some cross-sections of underdeveloped inflorescences to finish us off. It's a bit of chaos inside these with all the cottony hairs and pappus from the florets, but you can see how deep these inflorescences go into the plant!

These tiny annual daisies belong to the genus Actinobole, endemic to Australia. They remind me of some Saussurea species on the alpine screes of central Asia. Actinobole adapts to hot and dry conditions, while Saussurea to cold and wet.

'damp lumps radiating like the spokes of a wheel'.

Another dwarf daisy, found in all Australian mainland states, growing in sandy, loamy and granitic soils in a variety of habitats throughout inland Australia. We found it growing in all three types of soil. Apparently it grow to 12cm high, but we didn't see any even approaching that.