Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Herbs.

Stems: Stems erect or ascending, densely leafy, 3–10 dm long, conspicuously striate.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Alternate. Blades linear, somewhat conduplicate, 4–7 cm long, 1.5–4 mm wide. Surfaces sparsely puberulent, usually more densely so toward base, the hairs multicellular, gradually tapering to a petiole. Margins entire or sinuate. Petioles 5–13 mm long. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers in terminal or axillary, bracteate inflorescences. Bracts obovate, ca. 1 mm long, 0.7 mm wide, apex aristate. Flowers unisexual; plants monoecious. Calyx of 3 sepals, green, dimorphic, those of the staminate flowers lanceolate, 1.3 mm long, 0.8 mm wide, apex aristate, those of the pistillate flowers spatulate, 0.8–1 mm long, 0.2–0.5 mm wide, apex aristate. Corolla (petals) absent. Stamens 3, distinct; anthers dithecal. Ovary superior, 2–3(4)-carpellate, the carpels connate to form a compound, 1-celled ovary; ovule placentation basal, free-central, or rarely apical; style 1, often lobed; stigmas 2.

Fruit: Circumscissile; irregularly dehiscent; or indehiscent urticle; 2–3 beaked at apex; ovoid; compressed; 0.81 mm long; 0.6–0.8 mm wide; indehiscent; the surface rugose; the apex with a short ring surrounding the stigmas. Seeds 1 per fruit; the surface usually lustrous; endosperm essentially absent.reddish black; shiny; lenticular.

Ploidy: 2n = 34*

Habitat:

Elevation Range: 120–215 m.