Favoritos de ben-johnson

Grey Spider Flower (Grevillea buxifolia subsp. buxifolia) off Purchase Road in West Pennant Hills, New South Wales, Australia. Photographed on 7 September 1974.

Digitised from a slide. The original slide, which is of higher quality, is held.

This angiosperm is a Grevillea buxifolia (Grey Spider Flower)

It belongs to the family Proteaceae because …
• It is a woody shrub
• It has alternate leaf arrangement
• Its leaves have entire margins and stipules are absent
• There is no calyx present
• Inflorescences are in pairs and are condensed into conflorescences
• The individual flowers have both styles and stamens so are bisexual
The plant belongs to the genus Grevillea because …
• It is a shrub
• The leaves are vertically flattened and have entire margins
• Leaves have pinnate venation
• There are units of conflorescences
• The flowers are zygomorphic
• There is a receptacle-like dish on the flowers
• The pollen presenter is discoid
I am sure it is a Grevillea buxifolia for the following reasons:
• It was a shrub that was 1.5m tall suiting the height range of 1-2m
• The branchlets are villous
• The leaves are narrowly elliptic with entire margins that are slightly recurved
• The conflorescences are arranged in an umbel
• The perianth is also villous on both the outer and inner surface which appears woolly
• The pollen presenter is slightly convex
• The style is is antorsely-directed with a dorsal and horn-like appendage that was 2mm long matching the description on the NSW Flora database
• The national park is a sandstone woodland, where the flower is commonly located

I am fairly certain this is a Grevillea buxifolia because the other Grevillea species had differently coloured inflorescences, most commonly red.

Identification made using NSW Flora and Robinson's Field Guide to the Native Plants of Sydney