- ≡ Cotula minor (Hook.f.) Hook.f., Handb. New Zealand Fl. 142 (1864)
- = Cotula haastii Kirk, Stud. Fl. New Zealand 325 (1899)
A creeping perennial herb forming open patches. Rhizomes on the soil surface, slender to stout, 0.5-2.0 mm diam.; branches produced earlier in season clustered, up to ca. 5 radiating from around a flowering node; branches produced later in season us. single at flowering nodes. Leaves 3-many clustered at the apex, under better conditions older leaves up to 2 cm apart. Short shoots absent or with 1-few small leaves. Roots ± thick, 0.5-1.0 mm diam. Leaves 1-pinnatifid, 1-5 × 0.3-1.0 cm; blade 0.3-4.0 cm, obovate, coriaceous, dull green, usually with brown pigment on proximal pinnae, ± glabrous; pinnae 5-12 pairs, not overlapping, cut to rhachis, obovate, teeth 0 or up to 7 per pinna, us. restricted to proximal pinnae, on distal margins, cut ½-2/3 across pinna, oblong, obtuse and minutely mucronate. Peduncles borne on rhizomes, equal to or longer than leaves, slender, 2-5 cm, nude or with 1 simple bract, pilose. Monoecious. Heads 4-6 mm diam.; surface convex; involucre outspread; phyllaries 15-20 in 2 equal rows, suborbicular, pilose, with a wide brown scarious margin, not growing after anthesis; pistillate florets 70-130 in 2 or more rows, ca. 1.75 mm long, straight, white; corolla twice as long as wide, with equal teeth; staminate florets ca. equal in number. Achenes ca. 1.0 × 0.5 mm, slightly compressed but almost round in section, pale brown, transversely wrinkled. Flowers through the spring and summer and at a reduced rate in autumn and occ. winter.
[Reproduced from Lloyd (1972, New Zealand J. Bot. 10: 277–372, as Cotula minor (Hook.f.) Hook.f.) with permission from The Royal Society of New Zealand.]