Borya sphaerocephala

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Family Boryaceae

Taxonomy: Borya sphaerocephala R.Br.

Synonyms: 2 (APC 2026-07-30)

Baumgartenia sphaerocephala (R.Br.) Spreng. (nomenclatural synonym)
Borya cataractae Endl. (taxonomic synonym)

Misapplied names: 2 (APC 2026-07-30)

Borya lucens Poir. (misapplied)
Borya scirpoidea Lindl. (misapplied)

Distribution (APC): WA

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

Traits

Top source datasets: ABRS_1981 (2), ABRS_2022 (4), ABRS_2023 (8), ANBG_2019 (1), Chen_2017 (4), Cochrane_2019 (7), Dwyer_2017 (10), Harvey_2017 (6), Kew_2019_1 (2), Sjostrom_2006 (4), Tsakalos_2020 (17), Tsakalos_2022 (3), WAH_1998 (1), WAH_2022_2 (3), WAH_2023_2 (2), Wenk_2022 (2), Wenk_2023 (1), Wheeler_2002 (10), eFLOWER_Dun_2022 (20). See below for a full list of sources.
Summary: AusTraits contains 57 traits from 107 records in 19 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

resprouting_capacity (categorical): resprouts (3) [sources: Cochrane_2019; Harvey_2017; Tsakalos_2020]

flower morphology

flower_colour (categorical): white_cream (1) [sources: eFLOWER_Dun_2022]
sex_type (categorical): hermaphrodite (1) [sources: Sjostrom_2006]

fruit morphology

fruit_type (categorical): capsule (3) [sources: ABRS_2023; Chen_2017; Sjostrom_2006]
fruit_fleshiness (categorical): dry (3) [sources: Chen_2017; Sjostrom_2006; Tsakalos_2020]
fruit_dehiscence (categorical): dehiscent (2) [sources: Chen_2017; Sjostrom_2006]

leaf morphology

leaf_length (numerical): 77.5 mm (35-120 mm) [sources: ABRS_2023; Wheeler_2002]
leaf_width (numerical): 0.92 mm (0.4-1.3 mm) [sources: ABRS_2023; Wheeler_2002]
leaf_mass_per_area (numerical): 60.43 g/m2 (58.12-63.99 g/m2) [sources: Dwyer_2017]
leaf_shape (categorical): ensiform (1); linear (1) [sources: ABRS_2023; Wheeler_2002]
leaf_margin (categorical): entire (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
leaf_lobation (categorical): unlobed (1) [sources: Wheeler_2002]
leaf_compoundness (categorical): simple (3) [sources: ABRS_1981; Tsakalos_2020; Wheeler_2002]
leaf_glaucousness (categorical): not_glaucous (2) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
leaf_hairs_adult_leaves (categorical): hairy (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
plant_photosynthetic_organ (categorical): leaf (2) [sources: ABRS_2023; Tsakalos_2020]

life history

photosynthetic_pathway (categorical): c3 (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
plant_growth_form (categorical): herb (4) [sources: ABRS_2022; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2022; Wheeler_2002]
life_history (categorical): perennial (6) [sources: ABRS_2022; Cochrane_2019; Tsakalos_2020; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2023; Wheeler_2002]
woodiness_detailed (categorical): herbaceous (3); woody_base (1) [sources: ABRS_2022; Tsakalos_2020; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2022]
stem_growth_habit (categorical): erect (1); prostrate (2) [sources: ABRS_2022; Tsakalos_2020]
leaf_phenology (categorical): evergreen (1) [sources: ABRS_1981]
root_structure (categorical): arbuscular_mycorrhizal (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
parasitic (categorical): not_parasitic (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
flowering_time (categorical): nnnnnnnyyynn (1); nnnnyyyyyynn (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020; WAH_1998]
seedbank_location (categorical): canopy_seedbank_absent (1); soil_seedbank (1) [sources: Harvey_2017]
serotiny (categorical): not_serotinous (1) [sources: Harvey_2017]
vegetative_reproduction_ability (categorical): vegetative (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2022]
clonal_spread_mechanism (categorical): rhizome (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2022]
bud_bank_location (categorical): rhizome_non_woody (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2022]

seed morphology

seed_dry_mass (numerical): 0.05 mg (0.05-0.06 mg) [sources: ANBG_2019; Cochrane_2019; Kew_2019_1]

whole plant morphology

plant_height (numerical): 0.19 m (0.02-0.25 m) [sources: ABRS_2023; WAH_2023_2; Wheeler_2002]
plant_physical_defence_structures (categorical): absent (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]

Sources

dataset_id	n_traits	n_records	reference
eFLOWER_Dun_2022	19	20	L. Dun and H. Sauquet. “Unpublished: Floral traits for GAP taxa, University of New South Wales, Australia”. 2022.
Tsakalos_2020	16	17	J. L. Tsakalos, M. Renton, F. Riviera, E. J. Veneklaas, M. P. Dobrowolski, and L. Mucina. “Trait-based formal definition of plant functional types and functional communities in the multi-species and multi-traits context”. Ecological Complexity 40 (2019), p. 100787. doi: 10.1016/j.ecocom.2019.100787.
Dwyer_2017	2	10	J. M. Dwyer and D. C. Laughlin. “Constraints on trait combinations explain climatic drivers of biodiversity: The importance of trait covariance in community assembly”. Ecology Letters 20.7 (2017), pp. 872-882. doi: 10.1111/ele.12781.
Wheeler_2002	8	10	J. R. Wheeler, N. G. Marchant, and M. Lewington. Flora of the south west: Bunbury, Augusta, Denmark. Australian Biological Resources Study ; University of Western Australia Press, 2002. ISBN: 9780642568168.
ABRS_2023	6	8	Australian Biological Resources Study. Flora of Australia, Australian Biological Resources Study, Canberra.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2023. url: http://www.ausflora.org.au.
Cochrane_2019	5	7	A. Cochrane. “Effects of temperature on germination in eight Western Australian herbaceous species”. Folia Geobotanica 54.1-2 (2019), pp. 29-42. doi: 10.1007/s12224-019-09335-6.
Harvey_2017	6	6	J. M. Harvey, A. J. M. Hopkins, M. A. Langley, C. R. Gosper, M. R. Williams, and C. J. Yates. “Long-term studies of post-fire reproduction in an Australian shrubland and woodland”. Australian Journal of Botany 65.4 (2017), p. 339. doi: 10.1071/bt17011.
ABRS_2022	4	4	Australian Biological Resources Study. Flora of Australia, Australian Biological Resources Study, Canberra.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2022. url: http://www.ausflora.org.au.
Chen_2017	4	4	Chen, 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.
Sjostrom_2006	4	4	A. 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.
Tsakalos_2022	3	3	J. L. Tsakalos, G. Ottaviani, S. Chelli, A. Rea, S. Elder, M. P. Dobrowolski, and L. Mucina. “Plant clonality in a soil-impoverished open ecosystem: insights from southwest Australian shrublands”. Annals of Botany 130.7 (2022), pp. 981-990. doi: 10.1093/aob/mcac131.
WAH_2022_2	3	3	Western Australian Herbarium. Florabase—the Western Australian Flora.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2022. url: https://florabase.dpaw.wa.gov.au/.
ABRS_1981	2	2	B. 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/.
Kew_2019_1	1	2	Royal Botanic Gardens Kew. Seed Information Database (SID) and Seed Bank Database. 2019. url: http://data.kew.org/sid/.
WAH_2023_2	1	2	Western Australian Herbarium. Florabase—the Western Australian Flora.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2023. url: https://florabase.dpaw.wa.gov.au/.
Wenk_2022	2	2	E. Wenk. “Unpublished data: Australian plant growth forms dataset”. 2022.
ANBG_2019	1	1	Australian National Botanic Gardens. The National Seed Bank. 2018. url: http://www.anbg.gov.au/gardens/living/seedbank/.
WAH_1998	1	1	Western Australian Herbarium. FloraBase: The Western Australian flora. 1998. url: http://florabase.dpaw.wa.gov.au.
Wenk_2023	1	1	E. Wenk. “Unpublished data: Australian plant life history dataset, University of New South Wales, Sydney”. 2023.