AusTraits

Banksia polycephala

Explore the data for this taxon in the portal

Family Proteaceae

Taxonomy: Banksia polycephala (Benth.) A.R.Mast & K.R.Thiele

Synonyms: 2 (APC 2026-07-30)
  • Dryandra polycephala Benth. (nomenclatural synonym)
  • Josephia polycephala (Benth.) Kuntze (nomenclatural synonym)

Distribution (APC): WA

Profiles: APC, Flora of Australia, ALA, iNaturalist, Florabase, ATRP

Traits

Top source datasets: ABRS_1981 (3), ABRS_2022 (4), ABRS_2023 (15), Burrows_2008_2 (5), Burrows_2020 (5), Chen_2017 (5), Collette_2021 (1), Jordan_2020 (8), Kew_2019_1 (1), Sjostrom_2006 (4), Standish_2019 (7), Sweedman_2006 (4), WAH_1998 (1), WAH_2022_2 (4), WAH_2023_2 (2), Wenk_2022 (2), Wenk_2023 (1). See below for a full list of sources.
Summary: AusTraits contains 38 traits from 72 records in 17 datasets.

Traits by category (click to expand). For categorical traits, the values are listed. For numerical traits, the mean and range are shown.

fire response
flower morphology
  • sex_type (categorical): hermaphrodite (1) [sources: Sjostrom_2006]
fruit morphology
  • fruit_length (numerical): 8 mm (7-9 mm) [sources: ABRS_2023]
  • fruit_type (categorical): follicle (3) [sources: ABRS_2023; Chen_2017; Sjostrom_2006]
  • fruit_fleshiness (categorical): dry (2) [sources: Chen_2017; Sjostrom_2006]
  • fruit_dehiscence (categorical): dehiscent (2) [sources: Chen_2017; Sjostrom_2006]
leaf morphology
life history
  • plant_growth_form (categorical): shrub (4) [sources: ABRS_2022; Standish_2019; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2022]
  • life_history (categorical): perennial (7) [sources: ABRS_2022; Burrows_2008_2; Burrows_2020; Jordan_2020; Standish_2019; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2023]
  • woodiness_detailed (categorical): woody (3) [sources: ABRS_2022; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2022]
  • stem_growth_habit (categorical): bushy (1); erect (1) [sources: ABRS_2022; WAH_2022_2]
  • leaf_phenology (categorical): evergreen (1) [sources: ABRS_1981]
  • nitrogen_fixing (categorical): non_nitrogen_fixer (1) [sources: Standish_2019]
  • root_structure (categorical): proteoid_root (1) [sources: Standish_2019]
  • reproductive_maturity (numerical): 4 a (4-4 a) [sources: Burrows_2020]
  • flowering_time (categorical): nnnnnnnyyynn (2); nnnnnnyyyynn (1) [sources: ABRS_1981; Chen_2017; WAH_1998]
  • seedbank_location (categorical): canopy_seedbank (3) [sources: Burrows_2008_2; Burrows_2020; Standish_2019]
  • seed_dormancy_class (categorical): non_dormant (1) [sources: Collette_2021]
  • bud_bank_location (categorical): none (1) [sources: Burrows_2008_2]
seed morphology
  • seed_dry_mass (numerical): 9.76 mg (7.82-11.71 mg) [sources: Kew_2019_1; Standish_2019]
whole plant morphology
  • plant_height (numerical): 3.19 m (0.75-4 m) [sources: ABRS_2023; WAH_2023_2]

Sources

dataset_idn_traitsn_recordsreference
ABRS_20231115Australian Biological Resources Study. Flora of Australia, Australian Biological Resources Study, Canberra.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2023. url: http://www.ausflora.org.au.
Jordan_202088G. J. Jordan, R. J. Carpenter, B. R. Holland, N. J. Beeton, M. D. Woodhams, and T. J. Brodribb. “Links between environment and stomatal size through evolutionary time in Proteaceae”. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 287.1919 (2020), p. 20192876. doi: 10.1098/rspb.2019.2876.
Standish_201977R. Standish. “Unpublished data: Jarrah forest, Murdoch University”. 2019.
Burrows_2008_255N. D. Burrows, G. Wardell-Johnson, and B. Ward. “Post-fire juvenile period of plants in south-west Australia forests and implications for fire management”. Journal of the Royal Society of Western Australia 91 (2008), pp. 163-174. ISSN: 0035922X. url: http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/19156 (visited on 03/27/2025).
Burrows_202055N. Burrows. Data from 'Plant Ecological Attributes' theme, NatureMap, DBCA, WA. 2020.
Chen_201755Chen, S.-C., Cornwell, W., Z. H.-X., Moles, and A. T. “Plants show more flesh in the tropics: Variation in fruit type along latitudinal and climatic gradients.”. Ecography 40 (2017), pp. 531-538. doi: abs/10.1111/ecog.02010.
ABRS_202244Australian Biological Resources Study. Flora of Australia, Australian Biological Resources Study, Canberra.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2022. url: http://www.ausflora.org.au.
Sjostrom_200644A. Sjöström and C. L. Gross. “Life-history characters and phylogeny are correlated with extinction risk in the Australian angiosperms”. Journal of Biogeography 33.2 (2006), pp. 271-290. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2699.2005.01393.x.
Sweedman_200624L. Sweedman and D. Merritt. Australian Seeds: A Guide to Their Collection, Identification, and Biology. CSIRO Publishing, 2006. ISBN: 9780643094079.
WAH_2022_244Western Australian Herbarium. Florabase—the Western Australian Flora.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2022. url: https://florabase.dpaw.wa.gov.au/.
ABRS_198133B. A. Barlow, H. T. Clifford, A. S. George, and A. K. A. McCusker. Flora of Australia. 1981. url: http://www.environment.gov.au/biodiversity/abrs/online-resources/flora/main/.
WAH_2023_212Western Australian Herbarium. Florabase—the Western Australian Flora.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2023. url: https://florabase.dpaw.wa.gov.au/.
Wenk_202222E. Wenk. “Unpublished data: Australian plant growth forms dataset”. 2022.
Collette_202111J. C. Collette and M. K. J. Ooi. “Distribution of seed dormancy classes across a fire-prone continent: effects of rainfall seasonality and temperature”. Annals of Botany 127.5 (2021), pp. 613-620. doi: 10.1093/aob/mcaa203.
Kew_2019_111Royal Botanic Gardens Kew. Seed Information Database (SID) and Seed Bank Database. 2019. url: http://data.kew.org/sid/.
WAH_199811Western Australian Herbarium. FloraBase: The Western Australian flora. 1998. url: http://florabase.dpaw.wa.gov.au.
Wenk_202311E. Wenk. “Unpublished data: Australian plant life history dataset, University of New South Wales, Sydney”. 2023.