Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Annual herbs, branched from base.

Stems: Stems procumbent to ascending, up to ca. 3–4 dm long.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Alternate or lower ones opposite. Blades broadly elliptic–ovate to elliptic, 0.7–1.5 cm long, 0.3–0.7 cm wide. Surfaces densely mealy pubescent. Margins entire or with a few teeth in upper part. Petiolate. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers in axillary clusters; staminate flowers without subtending bracts; pistillate flowers each subtended by 2 accrescent bracts enclosing the fruit. Flowers unisexual (and the plants monoecious). Calyx of staminate flowers with 3–5 lobes. Corolla (petals) absent. Stamens in staminate flower 3–5, inserted on calyx at base; pistillate flowers Stamens absent; anthers dithecal, opening by longitudinal slits. Ovary superior (pistillate flowers), 1-celled, placentation basal; ovule 1; stigmas 2, filiform, dry.

Fruit: Utricle with membranous pericarp; enclosed by the persistent bracts; fruiting bracts green; chartaceous; connate ca. ½ their length; fan–shaped; ca. 4–5 mm long; the limbs unequal; the posterior one longer; conspicuously green–reticulate; apex 3–5–toothed; the anterior face with 2 appendages ca. 2 mm long near base; the basal tube ca. 1.5–2 mm long. Seeds not observed.

Ploidy:

Habitat:

Elevation Range: