Tecticornia tenuis
(Benth.) K.A.Sheph. & Paul G.WilsonDivaricately branched shrub to c. 70 cm high and diam. Articles of ultimate branches cylindric to narrowly obovoid, mostly 6–12 mm long, green or somewhat glaucous; lobes acute to acuminate, sometimes narrowly keeled, erect or spreading, margins entire, broadly scarious. Spikes terminal or vegetative growth continuing, mostly 10–20 mm long, comprising 5–10 articles similar to but shorter than vegetative ones; flowers fused to each other in lower part, and to bract above. Fruiting spike persistent, fusiform, with bracts pithy, or shrivelled in older spikes; fruiting perianth membranous, pericarp woody, becoming embedded in the grooved, woody axis of the spike; style not exserted; seed elliptic or somewhat reniform, c. 1.5 mm long, released only after disintegration of spike axis. Flowers Aug.–Oct.
LoM, MuM, VRiv, MSB, RobP. Also WA, NT, SA, Qld, NSW. In Victoria confined to heavy, somewhat saline soils of the Murray River floodplain and old lakebeds in the north-west (e.g. Nowingi, Benetook, Mildura, Lake Wallawalla and Manangatang districts), but locally common.
Walsh, N.G. (1996). Chenopodiaceae. In: Walsh, N.G.; Entwisle, T.J., Flora of Victoria Vol. 3, Dicotyledons Winteraceae to Myrtaceae, pp. 129–199. Inkata Press, Melbourne.
