Spermacoce brachystema

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Family Rubiaceae

Taxonomy: Spermacoce brachystema R.Br. ex Benth.

Synonyms: 4 (APC 2026-07-30)

Borreria brachystema (R.Br. ex Benth.) Valeton (nomenclatural synonym)
Spermacoce brachystema R.Br. ex Benth. subvar. brachystema (nomenclatural synonym)
Spermacoce brachystema R.Br. ex Benth. var. brachystema (nomenclatural synonym)
Spermacoce brachystoma F.Muell. (orthographic variant)

Misapplied names: 1 (APC 2026-07-30)

Spermacoce stricta L.f. (misapplied)

Distribution (APC): WA, NT, Qld, NSW

Profiles: APC, Flora of Australia, ALA, iNaturalist, NSW Flora, NT eFlora, Florabase, ATRP

Traits

Top source datasets: ATRP_2020 (3), Kew_2019_1 (2), Munroe_2019 (1), NHNSW_2014_2 (3), NHNSW_2022 (4), NHNSW_2023 (13), NSWFRD_2014 (3), NTH_2022 (4), NTH_2023 (14), Sjostrom_2006 (4), WAH_1998 (1), WAH_2022_2 (3), WAH_2023_2 (2), Wenk_2022 (2), Wenk_2023 (1), White_2020 (19), Wright_2000 (5). See below for a full list of sources.
Summary: AusTraits contains 45 traits from 84 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

resprouting_capacity (categorical): fire_killed (2) [sources: NSWFRD_2014; White_2020]

flower morphology

flower_colour (categorical): blue_purple (1); white_cream (1) [sources: NHNSW_2014_2]
sex_type (categorical): hermaphrodite (1) [sources: Sjostrom_2006]

fruit morphology

fruit_length (numerical): 2 mm (2-2 mm) [sources: NHNSW_2023]
fruit_type (categorical): capsule (4) [sources: NHNSW_2023; NTH_2023; Sjostrom_2006; Wright_2000]
fruit_fleshiness (categorical): dry (2) [sources: Sjostrom_2006; Wright_2000]
fruit_dehiscence (categorical): dehiscent (4) [sources: NHNSW_2023; NTH_2023; Sjostrom_2006; Wright_2000]

leaf morphology

leaf_length (numerical): 35 mm (15-60 mm) [sources: NHNSW_2023; NTH_2023]
leaf_width (numerical): 4 mm (2-7 mm) [sources: NHNSW_2023; NTH_2023]
leaf_shape (categorical): lanceolate (1); linear (2); narrowly_elliptical (1) [sources: NHNSW_2023; NTH_2023]
leaf_margin (categorical): entire (1) [sources: NHNSW_2014_2]
leaf_margin_posture (categorical): revolute (1) [sources: NHNSW_2023]
leaf_compoundness (categorical): simple (1) [sources: NHNSW_2023]
leaf_phyllotaxis (categorical): opposite (1) [sources: NHNSW_2023]
plant_photosynthetic_organ (categorical): leaf (2) [sources: NHNSW_2023; NTH_2023]

life history

photosynthetic_pathway (categorical): c3 (2) [sources: Munroe_2019; White_2020]
plant_growth_form (categorical): herb (7); shrub (1); subshrub (1) [sources: ATRP_2020; NHNSW_2022; NSWFRD_2014; NTH_2022; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2022; White_2020]
life_history (categorical): annual (4) [sources: ATRP_2020; NHNSW_2022; NTH_2022; Wenk_2023]
woodiness_detailed (categorical): herbaceous (4); woody (1) [sources: NHNSW_2022; NTH_2022; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2022]
stem_growth_habit (categorical): erect (4); spreading (3) [sources: ATRP_2020; NHNSW_2022; NTH_2022; WAH_2022_2]
nitrogen_fixing (categorical): non_nitrogen_fixer (1) [sources: White_2020]
parasitic (categorical): not_parasitic (1) [sources: White_2020]
pollination_syndrome (categorical): insect (1) [sources: White_2020]
dispersal_syndrome (categorical): epizoochory (1) [sources: White_2020]
dispersers (categorical): mammals (1) [sources: White_2020]
flowering_time (categorical): nnyyyyyynnnn (1); yyyyynnnnnyy (2); yyyyynnnyyyy (1) [sources: NHNSW_2014_2; NSWFRD_2014; WAH_1998; White_2020]
seedbank_longevity_class (categorical): persistent (1) [sources: White_2020]
vegetative_reproduction_ability (categorical): not_vegetative (1) [sources: White_2020]

seed morphology

seed_dry_mass (numerical): 0.69 mg (0.58-0.8 mg) [sources: Kew_2019_1]
seed_length (numerical): 2.1 mm (2.1-2.1 mm) [sources: NTH_2023]
seed_width (numerical): 1.1 mm (1.1-1.1 mm) [sources: NTH_2023]
seed_shape (categorical): ellipsoid (1) [sources: NTH_2023]

whole plant morphology

plant_height (numerical): 0.43 m (0.1-0.6 m) [sources: NHNSW_2023; NTH_2023; WAH_2023_2]
plant_physical_defence_structures (categorical): absent (1) [sources: White_2020]

Sources

dataset_id	n_traits	n_records	reference
White_2020	19	19	M. White, S. Sinclair, and D. Frood. Victorian Vital Attributes Database. database. Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning, Victoria, 2020.
NTH_2023	12	14	D. of Land Resource Management and N. T. of Australia. Northern Territory Flora Online. accessed on 6 May, 2022.. 2022. url: http://eflora.nt.gov.au/.
NHNSW_2023	11	13	N. H. of New South Wales. The Plant Information Network System of The Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust Version 2.0.. accessed on 6 May, 2022.. 2023. url: https://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/.
Wright_2000	5	5	I. J. Wright, H. T. Clifford, R. Kidson, M. L. Reed, B. L. Rice, and M. Westoby. “A survey of seed and seedling characters in 1744 Australian dicotyledon species: Cross-species trait correlations and correlated trait-shifts within evolutionary lineages”. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 69 (2000), pp. 521-547. doi: 10.1111/j.1095-8312.2000.tb01222.x.
NHNSW_2022	4	4	N. H. of New South Wales. The Plant Information Network System of The Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust Version 2.0.. accessed on 6 May, 2022.. 2022. url: https://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/.
NTH_2022	4	4	D. of Land Resource Management and N. T. of Australia. Northern Territory Flora Online. accessed on 6 May, 2022.. 2022. url: http://eflora.nt.gov.au/.
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.
ATRP_2020	3	3	F. A. Zich, B. P. Hyland, T. Whiffin, and R. A. Kerrigan. Australian Tropical Rainforest Plants, Edition 8. 2020. url: https://apps.lucidcentral.org/rainforest/text/intro/index.html.
NHNSW_2014_2	3	3	Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney. PLantNET: NSW flora online. 2014. url: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/.
NSWFRD_2014	3	3	B. Kenny, C. Orscheg, E. Tasker, M. A. Gill, and R. Bradstock. NSW Flora Fire Response Database, v2.1. database. NSW Department of Planning Industry and Environment, 2014.
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/.
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.
Munroe_2019	1	1	S. E. M. Munroe, F. A. McInerney, J. Andrae, N. Welti, G. R. Guerin, E. Leitch, T. Hall, S. Szarvas, R. Atkins, S. Caddy-Retalic, and B. Sparrow. “The Photosynthetic Pathways of Plant Species Surveyed in Australia's National Terrestrial Monitoring Network”. Scientific Data 8 (2021), p. 97. doi: 10.1038/s41597-021-00877-z.
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.