Styphelia xerophylla

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Family Ericaceae

Taxonomy: Styphelia xerophylla (DC.) F.Muell.

Synonyms: 2 (APC 2026-07-30)

Astroloma xerophyllum (DC.) Sond. (nomenclatural synonym)
Stomarrhena xerophylla DC. (nomenclatural synonym)

Distribution (APC): WA

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

Traits

Top source datasets: Burrows_2008_2 (5), Burrows_2020 (5), Clarke_2015 (3), Collette_2021 (1), Detombeur_2021 (27), Enright_2014 (31), Hutton_1994 (1), Laliberte_2012 (8), Sjostrom_2006 (4), Sweedman_2006 (2), Tsakalos_2020 (18), Tsakalos_2022 (2), Veneklaas_2003 (20), WAH_1998 (1), WAH_2022_2 (4), WAH_2023_2 (2), Wenk_2022 (2), Wenk_2023 (1), Wilson_2004 (2), vanderMoezel_1987 (5). See below for a full list of sources.
Summary: AusTraits contains 58 traits from 144 records in 20 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 (20); resprouts (1) [sources: Burrows_2008_2; Burrows_2020; Clarke_2015; Enright_2014; Tsakalos_2020; Wilson_2004; vanderMoezel_1987]
post_fire_recruitment (categorical): post_fire_recruitment (17) [sources: Clarke_2015; Enright_2014; vanderMoezel_1987]
fire_time_from_fire_to_flowering (numerical): 48 mo (48-48 mo) [sources: Burrows_2020]

flower morphology

sex_type (categorical): hermaphrodite (1) [sources: Sjostrom_2006]

fruit morphology

fruit_type (categorical): drupe (1) [sources: Sjostrom_2006]
fruit_fleshiness (categorical): dry (1); fleshy (1) [sources: Sjostrom_2006; Tsakalos_2020]
fruit_dehiscence (categorical): indehiscent (1) [sources: Sjostrom_2006]

leaf morphology

leaf_area (numerical): 146.96 mm2 (121.77-172.16 mm2) [sources: Laliberte_2012]
leaf_mass_per_area (numerical): 178.67 g/m2 (123.72-223.21 g/m2) [sources: Laliberte_2012; Veneklaas_2003]
leaf_dry_matter_content (numerical): 0.53 g/g (0.49-0.56 g/g) [sources: Laliberte_2012; Veneklaas_2003]
leaf_water_content_per_dry_mass (numerical): 0.44 g/g (0.44-0.44 g/g) [sources: Veneklaas_2003]
leaf_type (categorical): broadleaf (1) [sources: Veneklaas_2003]
leaf_margin (categorical): entire (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
leaf_compoundness (categorical): simple (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
leaf_lamina_posture (categorical): conduplicate (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
leaf_glaucousness (categorical): not_glaucous (2) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
leaf_hairs_adult_leaves (categorical): hairy (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
plant_photosynthetic_organ (categorical): leaf (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]

life history

photosynthetic_pathway (categorical): c3 (2) [sources: Tsakalos_2020; Veneklaas_2003]
plant_growth_form (categorical): shrub (4) [sources: Laliberte_2012; Veneklaas_2003; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2022]
life_history (categorical): perennial (5) [sources: Burrows_2008_2; Burrows_2020; Tsakalos_2020; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2023]
woodiness_detailed (categorical): woody (3) [sources: Tsakalos_2020; WAH_2022_2; Wenk_2022]
stem_growth_habit (categorical): erect (2) [sources: Tsakalos_2020; WAH_2022_2]
leaf_phenology (categorical): evergreen (1) [sources: Veneklaas_2003]
nitrogen_fixing (categorical): non_nitrogen_fixer (1) [sources: Veneklaas_2003]
root_structure (categorical): ericoid_mycorrhizal (3) [sources: Hutton_1994; Laliberte_2012; Tsakalos_2020]
parasitic (categorical): not_parasitic (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]
reproductive_maturity (numerical): 4 a (4-4 a) [sources: Burrows_2020]
flowering_time (categorical): nnnnnnnyynnn (1); nnnnnnyyyynn (1); nnnnyyyyyynn (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020; WAH_1998; vanderMoezel_1987]
seedbank_location (categorical): soil_seedbank (3) [sources: Burrows_2008_2; Burrows_2020; Enright_2014]
seed_dormancy_class (categorical): morphophysiological_dormancy (1) [sources: Collette_2021]
vegetative_reproduction_ability (categorical): not_vegetative (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2022]
clonal_spread_mechanism (categorical): non_clonal (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2022]
bud_bank_location (categorical): none (2) [sources: Burrows_2008_2; Clarke_2015]

nutrient and stable isotope

leaf_N_per_dry_mass (numerical): 9.8 mg/g (9.8-9.8 mg/g) [sources: Veneklaas_2003]
leaf_P_per_dry_mass (numerical): 0.37 mg/g (0.31-0.43 mg/g) [sources: Detombeur_2021]

whole plant morphology

plant_height (numerical): 0.62 m (0.25-1 m) [sources: WAH_2023_2]
plant_physical_defence_structures (categorical): absent (1) [sources: Tsakalos_2020]

Sources

dataset_id	n_traits	n_records	reference
Enright_2014	3	31	N. J. Enright, J. B. Fontaine, B. B. Lamont, B. P. Miller, and V. C. Westcott. “Resistance and resilience to changing climate and fire regime depend on plant functional traits”. Journal of Ecology 102 (2014), pp. 1572-1581. doi: 10.1111/1365-2745.12306.
Detombeur_2021	9	27	F. de Tombeur, E. Laliberte, H. Lambers, M. Faucon, G. Zemunik, B. L. Turner, J. Cornelis, and G. Mahy. “A shift from phenol to silica-based leaf defenses during long-term soil and ecosystem development”. Ecology Letters 24.5 (2021), pp. 984-995. doi: 10.1111/ele.13713.
Veneklaas_2003	18	20	E. J. Veneklaas and P. Poot. “Seasonal patterns in water use and leaf turnover of different plant functional types in a species-rich woodland, south-western Australia”. Plant and Soil 257.2 (2003), pp. 295-304. doi: 10.1023/a:1027383920150.
Tsakalos_2020	17	18	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.
Laliberte_2012	5	8	E. Laliberte, B. L. Turner, T. Costes, S. J. Pearse, K. Wyrwoll, G. Zemunik, and H. Lambers. “Experimental assessment of nutrient limitation along a 2-million-year dune chronosequence in the south-western Australia biodiversity hotspot”. Journal of Ecology 100 (2012), pp. 631-642. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2745.2012.01962.x.
Burrows_2008_2	5	5	N. 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_2020	5	5	N. Burrows. Data from 'Plant Ecological Attributes' theme, NatureMap, DBCA, WA. 2020.
vanderMoezel_1987	5	5	P. G. van der Moezel, W. A. Loneragan, and D. T. Bell. “Northern Sandplain Kwongan - regeneration following fire, juvenile period and flowering phenology”. Journal of the Royal Society of Western Australia 69.4 (1987), pp. 123-132.
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.
WAH_2022_2	4	4	Western Australian Herbarium. Florabase—the Western Australian Flora.. accessed on 14 September, 2022.. 2022. url: https://florabase.dpaw.wa.gov.au/.
Clarke_2015	3	3	P. J. Clarke, M. J. Lawes, B. P. Murphy, J. Russell-Smith, C. E. Nano, R. Bradstock, N. J. Enright, J. B. Fontaine, C. R. Gosper, I. Radford, J. J. Midgley, and R. M. Gunton. “A synthesis of postfire recovery traits of woody plants in Australian ecosystems”. Science of The Total Environment 534 (2015), pp. 31-42. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2015.04.002.
Sweedman_2006	2	2	L. Sweedman and D. Merritt. Australian Seeds: A Guide to Their Collection, Identification, and Biology. CSIRO Publishing, 2006. ISBN: 9780643094079.
Tsakalos_2022	2	2	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_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.
Wilson_2004	2	2	B. A. Wilson, J. Kuehs, L. E. Valentine, T. Sonneman, and K. M. Wolfe. “Guidelines for ecological burning regimes in Mediterranean ecosystems: a case study in Banksia woodlands in Western Australia”. Pacific Conservation Biology 20.1 (2014), p. 57. doi: 10.1071/pc140057.
Collette_2021	1	1	J. 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.
Hutton_1994	1	1	B. J. Hutton, K. W. Dixon, and K. Sivasithamparam. “Ericoid endophytes of Western Australian heaths (Epacridaceae)”. New Phytologist 127.3 (1994), pp. 557-566. ISSN: 1469-8137. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8137.1994.tb03974.x.
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.