About Maireana brevifolia (R.Br.) Paul G.Wilson
Maireana brevifolia, also commonly called cotton bush, is a bushy, erect or rounded shrub or short-lived perennial plant. It reaches a height of 0.2 to 1 metre (7.9 inches to 3 feet 3.4 inches), and has thin branches sparsely covered with woolly hairs. Its leaves are obovate (egg-shaped with the narrower end at the base) to slender spindle-shaped, 2 to 5 millimetres (0.079 to 0.197 inches) long, fleshy, and glabrous. The flowers are bisexual, arranged singly, and are mostly glabrous. The glabrous, thin-walled fruiting perianth is hemispherical, about 2 millimetres (0.079 inches) in diameter, with a faintly ten-ribbed tube and five papery, fan-shaped wings up to 2 to 3 millimetres (0.079 to 0.118 inches) long. This species grows in heavy, winter-wet and sometimes saline soils across south-western Western Australia, the banks of the upper Finke River in southern Northern Territory, south-eastern South Australia, Queensland, inland New South Wales, and Victoria. It is one of the first species to colonize disturbed saline habitats. Cotton bush is also naturalised in South Africa, the Middle East, and the Canary Islands.
