About Myosotis traversii Hook.fil.
Myosotis traversii Hook.fil. plants grow as single rosettes, which often cluster together to form clumps or tufts. The rosette leaves have petioles 4–29 mm long. Their leaf blades measure 5–33 mm long by 3–12 mm wide, with a length to width ratio of 1.5–4.5:1. Blades are usually oblanceolate, narrowly obovate, or obovate, widest at or above the middle, and have an obtuse apex. The upper surface and edges of the leaf are densely covered in mostly flexuous, patent, forward-facing (antrorse) hairs that are oriented mostly oblique to the mid vein. The lower leaf surface has similar hairs, but they are entirely backward-facing (retrorse), or mostly retrorse with only some antrorse hairs near the apex. Each rosette produces 2–14 erect, usually once-branched, bractless inflorescences that can reach 230 mm long. Inflorescences typically bifurcate into an open or condensed forked V shape near their tips. There are up to 18 cauline leaves per inflorescence; these are similar to rosette leaves but smaller with shorter petioles, decreasing in size and becoming sessile toward the inflorescence tip. Each inflorescence bears up to 75 flowers, each on a pedicel that reaches up to 2 mm long at fruiting, with no bract. The calyx is 3–7 mm long at flowering and 4–9 mm long at fruiting, lobed to one-third to one-half of its length. It is densely covered in antrorse hairs, with some retrorse hairs near the base; these hairs are appressed to patent and flexuous, or patent to erect and hooked. The corolla is white or yellow, up to 8 mm in diameter, with a cylindrical tube. Petals are broadly ovate, very broadly ovate, broadly obovate, or very broadly obovate. Small yellow or light yellow scales alternate with the petals. The stamens measure 4–9 mm long from the base of the calyx to the anther tips, with filaments 0.1–0.8 mm long. The anthers are partly exserted, with their tips only surpassing or equaling the scales. The four smooth, shiny, medium to dark brown nutlets are 1.5–2.7 mm long by 0.8–1.8 mm wide, and narrowly ovoid or ovoid in shape. The chromosome number of M. traversii subsp. traversii is 2n = 44 (voucher specimen CHR 100421). This species flowers and fruits from November to March, with the main flowering and fruiting period falling between December and February. Myosotis traversii is a forget-me-not endemic to the South Island of New Zealand, found in Marlborough, Western Nelson, Canterbury, Westland and Otago, at elevations from 690 to 2280 m above sea level. It grows on rocks, boulders, shingle, scree, slips and saddles, often in bare, exposed, dry, sunny sites that support few other plant species.
