New Zealand Musk

Thyridia repens is a low-growing perennial herb with small succulent leaves, which are unstalked, opposite, and greenish-purple covered with tiny pits or dots. The flowers are comparatively large, about 15 mm (0.59 in) across, and either white or pale purple, lilac or mauve. The flowers, which are open for a single day in the field, have conspicuous yellow patches surrounded by white. The seed capsule is cylindrical and about 6.5 mm (0.26 in) long. In a study of T. repens at Lake Ellesmere, the most common pollinators were honey bees and the dronefly Eristalis tenax, followed by native bees Lasioglossum sordidum and Leioproctus, and the syrphid fly Melanostoma fasciatum. T. repens has low creeping branches, rising up to 15 centimetres (5.9 in) especially if the plant is sometimes submerged, and can form a carpet-like colony.

This species is found in the North and South Islands of New Zealand, as well as Tasmania and mainland Australia. It is coastal, found usually on muddy or silty flats periodically inundated by high tides. In New Zealand, the species is widely but sparsely distributed and naturally uncommon, especially in the Auckland area (although Thomas Kirk collected the type specimens of its synonym, Mimulus colensoi, at marshes in Onehunga). Resistant to being submerged by salt water, it cannot tolerate taller-growing plants or more vigorous prostrate species, and in some parts of the country is threatened by the spread of the salt grasses Spartina or Carex divisa.

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