Banksia xylothemelia is a sprawling woody shrub of the family Proteaceae endemic to southern Western Australia, one of the many species commonly known as dryandras and until recently called Dryandra xylothemelia. To date it is almost unknown in cultivation. Description It grows as a sprawling shrub up to high, often with basal shoots arising from an underground lignotuber. It has woolly stems. The leaves are pinnatifid with five to nine leaflets on each side, long, wide, smooth above but woolly beneath. Flowers occur in dome shaped heads up to across, attached directly to an older stem, or on a short stalk. Flower heads contain from 80 to 100 bright yellow flowers. Each flower consists of a tubular perianth made up of four fused tepals, and one long wiry style. The styles are hooked rather than straight, and are initially trapped inside the upper perianth parts, but break free at anthesis. Seeds are produced in follicles embedded in the woody bases of the flower heads. Taxonomy Early collections of B. xylothemelia include a specimen collected in the Dragon Rocks Nature Reserve by Robert M. Buehrig on 9 December 1993, and a specimen collected from west of Lake King by P. G. Wilson. On 11 October 1994, Alex George collected what would later become the type specimen, from a location on the Holt Rock South Road, north of Newdigate-Lake King Road, at . Two years later, George published a formal description of the species in Nuytsia 10(3), placing it in genus Dryandra, subgenus Dryandra and series Armatae. He gave it the specific name "xylothemelia", from the Greek "xylon" (wood) and "themelios" (foundation), in reference to species' lignotuber, the possession of which distinguishes it from its close relative B. cirsioides; thus the full name of the species was for a time Dryandra xylothemelia A.S.George. Early in 2007, Austin Mast and Kevin Thiele transferred all Dryandra taxa to Banksia. The current name for this species is therefore Banksia xylothemelia (A.S.George) A.R.Mast & K.R.Thiele. As an interim measure, Mast and Thiele placed all but one Dryandra taxon in Banksia ser. Dryandra. Distribution and habitat It occurs in sand over laterite or in gravelly loam, amongst heath or sometimes mallee woodlands and shrublands. It occurs only within the Esperance Plains and Mallee biogeographic region, between Kulin, Lake Magenta, Frank Hann National Park and Hyden. Ecology Like most other Proteaceae, B. xylothemelia has proteoid roots, roots with