Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Plants perennial (rhizomatous), usually glabrous, sometimes sparsely hairy.

Stems: Stems (10–)30–70(–100) cm.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Alternate. Blades asymmetric, ovate to ± reniform, (28–)46–72(–80) × (28–)33–85 mm. Apex obtuse. Base cuneate on shorter side, usually rounded on longer one. Surfaces glabrous. Margins not lobed, crenate, teeth apices setose, otherwise eciliate. Petioles 5–46 mm, glabrous. Stipules lanceolate to oblong, 7–19 × 3–6 mm.

Flowers: Flowers in peduncles 22–75 mm (in fruit); bracts lanceolate to ovate. Flowers unisexual (plants monoecious), white to pink. Tepals of staminate flowers 4, outer 2 (sepals) suborbiculate or reniform, 7–10 mm, inner 2 (petals) narrowly obovate, 5–7 mm; Tepals of pistillate flowers 4 or 5, obovate, 6–9 mm. Stamens 24–33. Ovary inferior.

Fruit: Capsules 8–15 × 6–12 mm; larger wings deltate–rounded; 10–17 mm wide; smaller 3.5–5 mm wide. Seeds numerous and small; endosperm essentially absent; reticulate.

Ploidy: 2n = 34; 56

Habitat: Along streams in swamps; floodplain woodlands; cabbage palmetto hummocks; wet ditches; wet and mucky soil; often in shade.

Elevation Range: 0–10 m.