Its discovery is accredited to a retired plant nursery owner, Geoff Davidson, who organised the land's protection a few decades prior, and found it by chance on a walk in November 2007.

[3] V. jovellanoides has a prostrate growth habit, forming large 2 to 3 m (6.6 to 9.8 ft) mats on the ground, and long stems with small, spatula-shaped leaves.

It has 2 m (6.6 ft) long red-brown decumbent stems which are covered in many tiny hairs and grow roots at nodes spaced 5 to 30 mm (0.20 to 1.2 in) apart.

[2][5]Veronica jovellanoides was discovered in November 2007 by Geoff Davidson, a local plant nursery owner and trustee of the NZ Native Forests Restoration Trust, when he found it growing in the Ernest Morgan Reserve on a walk with the field officer (of the NZFRT) Sharon Graham.

Peter de Lange, a New Zealand botanist, suggested after seeing the plant at Davidson's nursery that it was a member of the genus Veronica.

These features, or lack thereof, they argued, suggest that it diverged early from the Parahebe clade, an idea supported by a then unpublished genetic analysis.

[5] This analysis was published in the NZJB in 2013 and in it they concluded that V. jovellanoides' 20 pairs of chromosomes was unusual given the very few related species that shared the number.

[7] V. jovellanoides is endemic to New Zealand and occurs only (as of 2009[update]) in the upper North Island[2] in the Ernest Morgan Reserve northwest of Auckland.

Larger trees include: Dacrycarpus dacrydioides (Kahikatea), Prumnopitys taxifolia (Mataī), and Podocarpus totara var.

A large number of lichens and bryophytes were also found in the area including: Achrophyllum dentatum, Balantiopsis diplophylla, Bazzania adnexa, Heteroscyphus cunestipulis, Lembidium nutans, Leiomitria lanata, Monoclea forsteri, Paracromastigium furcifolium, Pendulothecium auriculatum, Pyrrhobryum bifarium, Pseudocyphellaria dissimilis, P. multifida, Trichocolea mollisima, and Sticta lacera.

In late summer (February in New Zealand) and autumn (March to May) it has been recorded dying back and becoming more difficult to maintain generally.