Pimelea octophylla is a shrub in the family Thymelaeaceae

Thymelaeaceae

Thymelaeaceae is a cosmopolitan family of flowering plants composed of 50 genera and 898 species. It was established in 1789 by Antoine Laurent de Jussieu.Thymelaeaceae is in the order Malvales...

, native to Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

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It grows up to 1 metre high and produces cream to pale yellow terminal flowerheads with long white hairs. The flowerheads have 25 to 150 flowers . The leaves are 2 to 15 mm long and 0.5 to 5 mm wide.

Taxonomy

The species was first formally described by botanist Robert Brown

Robert Brown (botanist)

Robert Brown was a Scottish botanist and palaeobotanist who made important contributions to botany largely through his pioneering use of the microscope...

 in Prodromus Florae Novae Hollandiae in 1810, from plant material that he collected from Arthurs Seat, Victoria

Arthurs Seat, Victoria

Arthurs Seat is a hill and locality on the Mornington Peninsula, within the Shire of Mornington Peninsula, about 75 km south east of Melbourne, Australia....

 in January 1804.

A number of former subspecies have been reclassified as follows:

• Pimelea octophylla subsp. ciliolaris Threlfall, is currently Pimelea ciliolaris (Threlfall) Rye
• Pimelea octophylla subsp. petraea Meisn., is currently Pimelea imbricata subsp. petrea (Meisn.) Rye
• Pimelea octophylla subsp. subvillefera Threlfall, is currently Pimelea subvellifera (Threlfall) Rye