Lanaria lanata flower beginnings

This early stage of a Lanaria lanata inflorescence still has all its flowers compactly together, covered in wool.

The thick flowering stalk has a few small, widely spaced leaves up its hairy surface.

Narrow, tapering bracts, also hairy, emerge from the woolly mass. These bracts will later subtend the different branches of the panicle in bloom, inconspicuously spaced among much wool and some flowers (Manning, 2007; Bean and Johns, 2005; Wikipedia).