Maireana amoena is a species of flowering plant in the family Chenopodiaceae and is endemic to Western Australia. It is a small, brittle shrub with fleshy, spherical, oval or terete leaves, pairs of male and female flowers, and a hemispherical utricle with a short tube and horizontal wings.
Description.
"Maireana amoena" is a small, brittle shrub that typically grows to high, its young branchlets covered with woolly hairs. The leaves are succulent, spherical, oval or terete, long and glabrous or covered with silky hairs. The flowers are white and arranged in pairs of male and female flowers, densely covered with short hairs. The fruiting perianth is mostly glabrous with a short tube with a horizontal, fan-shaped wing long.
Taxonomy.
This species was first formally described in 1904 by Ludwig Diels who gave it the name "Kochia amoena" in "Botanische Jahrbücher für Systematik, Pflanzengeschichte und Pflanzengeographie". In 1975, Paul Graham Wilson transferred the species to "Maireana" as "M. amoena" in the journal "Nuytsia". The specific epithet ("amoena") means 'charming' or 'showy'.
Distribution and habitat.
This species of "Maireana" is widespread in Western Australia where it usually grows on sandy rises near salt lakes from near Carnarvon to near Norseman.