Hypericum myrtifolium Lam.

Shrub (or subshrub?) 0.3-1 m tall, mostly 1-stemmed, erect from woody caudex, often unbranched below inflorescence, sometimes with branches in upper half, ascending. Stems glaucous green, 4-lined and ancipitous when young, soon 4-lined and rounded, becoming reddish brown and 2-lined to terete; cortex exfoliating in strips; bark greyish, becoming corky, thick. Leaves sessile, spreading, evergreen, (8-)13-40 x (5-)7-20 mm, oblong-ovate to triangular-lanceolate, margin recurved (especially when dry), paler and usually glaucous beneath, sometimes also glaucous above, coriaceous, eventually deciduous at or near semi-articulated base, apex rounded to obtuse or sometimes acute, base subcordate to cordate, amplexicaul; venation: 3-4 main laterals, with laxly reticulate secondaries, tertiaries not visible; laminar glands very dense. Inflorescence 7-c. 30-flowered, regularly dichasial, widely branched, sometimes with 1-3 accessory flowers at apical node, with solitary flowers or 3-7-flowered dichasia or flowering branches up to 3 nodes below, the whole hemispherical to subcorymbiform; pedicels to 3 mm long or absent; bracts foliar, reduced. Flowers (15-)20-25 mm in diam.; buds ovoid. Sepals 5, 5-8 x 2-4.5 mm, enlarging somewhat in fruit, imbricate, unequal to subequal, ovate to lanceolate, becoming foliaceous, acute, margin recurved; basal veins (3)5, branching and reticulating distally. Petals 5, bright yellow, becoming apically recurved, 8-15 x 4.5-6 mm, 1.5-2 x sepals, obovate to oblong-oblanceolate, with apiculus lateral, obtuse. Stamens c. 200, longest 5-9 mm, c. 0.6 x petals, deciduous. Ovary 3(4)-merous, 3-4 x 1.3-3 mm, narrowly pyramidal-ovoid, acute, placentation incompletely axile; styles 3(4), 4-5 mm, 1.2-1.3 x ovary, separating above in fruit. Capsule 5-6 x 3-4 mm, pyramidal-ovoid, 3(4)-lobed or 3(4)-gonous. Seeds blackish brown, c. 1 mm long, narrowly carinate; testa shallowly linear-reticulate.