Habit: rhizomatous, erect shrub to 20 cm by 20 cm wide, very twiggy; spinescent short shoots common, probably heteroblastic;persisting indumentum of white uniseriate hairs.Leaves: adult leaves clustered in groups of up to 7, sessile, obovate, to 10 mm long, 2 mm wide; margins revolute; abaxial surface hoary with white hairs.Inflorescences almost sessile bisexual, protandrous flowers with parts in fives, regularly placed, on short shoots; solitary flowers held beneath foliage at ground level; fleshy lobed basal nectary disc and uneven, overlapping leafy involucral bracts; pedicels are very short and very hairy. Sepals to about 10 mm mm long, or half way up the corolla, spreading, margins hairy, apices acuminate, caduceus. Petals 16–20 mm long, spathulate, cohering toward the middle, then spreading, not recurving; inner and outer petal surfaces hairy, creamy yellow. Stamens: filaments to 20 mm long, flat, ribbony, flared in middle, tapering to attachment point in sinus: anthers much shorter to 3 mm, dorsifixed, long thin sagittate in shape, white, dehiscing through slits. Pistil: ovary 4 mm, mainly bi-locular; ovules inserted to middle of chamber in two rows, hairy; style 17 mm long, erect hairs present; stigma exserted at anthesis, becoming slightly capitate. Fruit capsular 10–14 mm long, slightly longer than wide, loculicidally and septicidally dehiscent. Seeds numerous, inserted in two rows in each loculus, red-brown becoming black, lozenge shaped, to 1 mm long; surface glossy, colliculate (pitted like orange peel). Flowers September to October; fruit available mid-summer. Most probably bird pollinated.
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