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Posidonia australis
Also called Broadleaf Tapeweed, Seagrass, Fibre Ball Weed
Posidonia australis is a marine seagrass (not a land plant) that forms dense underwater meadows in the coastal waters of southern Australia, down to about 15 m deep. It cannot be grown as an ordinary garden or houseplant.
Posidonia australis, also known as strapweed, tapeweed, ribbonweed or fibre-ball weed, is a species of seagrass that occurs in the southern coastal waters of Australia. It grows subtidally to a depth of 15 m (49 ft), forming large meadows important to environmental conservation. Balls of resistant fibre from decomposing detritus from the foliage are found along nearby shore-lines.
In 2022, a single stand in Shark Bay was reported by scientists to be the largest plant in the world, extending around 180 km (110 miles) and covering an area of about 200 km2 (49,000 acres) of seafloor.
This species is found in waters around the southern coast of Australia. In Western Australia it occurs in the Shark Bay region, around islands of the Houtman Abrolhos, and southward along the coast of the Swan Coastal Plain. The species is recorded at the edge of the Esperance Plains, the Archipelago of the Recherche, at the southern coast of the southwest region. The range extends to the east to coastal areas of New South Wales, South Australia, Tasmania, and Victoria.
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Posidonia australis by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.
The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
