Slender, low growing shrub with glaborous stems and narrow elliptical leaves 5-20 mm long and approximately 2 mm wide. Flowers are in racemes starting out compact but elongating as they age. Flowers are white often tinged with pink, 7-10 mm long with sparsely haired sepals. Fruit is green and approximately 2.5 mm long.
Spiked Rice-flower |
Pimelea spicata
Status: Endangered on the EPBC Act list
Government evidence of impact of climate change:
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Australian Government, Conservation Advice, Pimelea spicata
Land clearing or land use changes; such as road construction or upgrades; or other infrastructural; industrial or residential developments; can also result in changes in the hydrology of the landscape; soil erosion and or sedimentation; nutrient or chemical pollution; weed invasion and or significant changes in the overlying vegetation composition and structure; which are likely significantly alter the natural fire regimes of native vegetation.
Fire High known The spiked rice flower is threatened by frequent fires.
Due to its frequency current urban setting; arson is a significant risk in the bushland remnants of of western Sydney; increasing the frequency of fire (DEC 2006).
Low potential Many of the smaller remnant spiked rice flower populations on the frequency current Cumberland Plain have been excluded from fire for long periods. of Given that the species growth; flowering; seed production; seed germination; and seedling survival all appear to be enhanced by disturbance disturbances; particularly wildfires; and the creation of gaps in the from fire overlying vegetation in the habitat of a population; a long term absence of such disturbances could be detrimental to the persistence a population (NSW NPWS 1997 and Matarczyk cited in DEC 2006).
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