Paranomus spathulatus Kuntze

A moderately branched shrub, 0.7-2.3 m high, young stems glabrous, reddish. Leaves polymorphic, dissected below, showing a gradual transition to entire leaves below the inflorescence, young plants with dissected leaves only, old plants in arid places with entire leaves only; 10-80 mm long, 5-70 mm wide, glabrous, glaucous. Entire leaves broadly f label late or spathulate, the lamina passing gradually into the petiole, petiole variable in length, shortly mucronate, the coriaceous margin reddish. Dissected leaves with narrow channelled segments, apiculum orange, obtuse. Peduncle short or lacking, the base with numerous linear-lanceolate, reddish bracts, hairy at the base, ciliate. Spike dense, 25-85 mm long, 23-33 mm wide, the flowers pink within. Bracts subtending the partial inflorescences about 8 mm long, broad and somewhat rhomboidal in the lower part, acuminate, the tip longest in the lowermost bracts, covered with dense woolly hairs when young, the hairs near the tip falling off early leaving the tip glabrous and reddish brown. Floral bracts usually a little longer than the subtending bract, ovate, somewhat acute, woolly, tending to become glabrus at the tip. Perianth in the mature bud 10-12 mm long, densely woolly in the western part of its range, the hairs adpressed east of Garcia's Pass, all segments alike. Style grabrous; pollen presenter about 2 mm long, widest in the upper part, with a slight knee-like bend below.