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Kōrero: Coastal shoreline

Spinifex

Image
Spinifex

The native sand-binding grass spinifex has distinctive runners carrying tufts of floppy grey-green leaves and ball-like seed heads. Spinifex plants are single-sexed, bearing either male or female flowers. This colony is female – apparent from the spiked seed heads among the tufts of leaves. When the wind blows, the seed heads roll along the beach until they become lodged against some obstacle, and release their seeds.

Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi

Department of Conservation

Reference: 10054807

by Lindsey MacFarlane

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Ngā whakaahua me ngā rauemi katoa o tēnei kōrero

Me pēnei te tohu i te whārang

Maggy Wassilieff, Coastal shoreline – Sand dunes, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/mi/photograph/4828/spinifex (accessed 4 June 2026).

He kōrero nā Maggy Wassilieff, i tāngia i te 2 March 2009.