Brachyglottis repanda

Brachyglottis repanda, known in te reo Maori as rangiora, is a soft-wooded evergreen shrub or small tree in the Asteraceae endemic to New Zealand, occurring in coastal and lowland forest throughout the North Island and the upper South Island. Plants reach 3 to 7 metres in height with stout, brittle, pithy stems. The alternate, long-petiolate leaves are exceptionally large for the family, ovate to broadly oblong, 10 to 25 centimetres long with shallowly toothed or sinuate margins, glabrous and glossy dark green above and densely clothed beneath in a felt of soft white tomentum. Large terminal panicles bear hundreds of small, cream to greenish white, fragrant disc-only capitula in spring; ray florets are absent or vestigial. The fruit is a small ribbed achene topped by a pappus of fine bristles aiding wind dispersal. Rangiora is a fast-growing pioneer of forest margins and disturbed gullies.