Author

Dan Stephens

Basal leaves

Common Name(s)

Spurwort; blue fieldmadder

Electronic links

USDA Plants Database species profile: http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol

Ecology

Lawns, disturbed areas (fields), roadsides, and thickets.

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Family

Rubiaceae -- Madder Family

Flowering period

March to May.

Flowers

Sepals 4-6 triangular, lanceolate, persistent, and accrescent in fruit

Corolla 4-5 mm across, pale-lilac, with a long slender tube about twice the length of the 4-5 free lobes.

Stamens 4-5 stamens on the corrala throat, or at the throat: filments free with the 2-cell anthers introse.

Pistil 1,  of 2 fused carpels, inferior ovary; 2 locules each with 1 ovule. Style 1, slender, 2-branched, stigma linear.

Fruit

Furit ca. 4 mm long, crowned by the sepals, composed of 2 obovid mericarps with a solitary seed in each; surface with short appressed bristles.

Geographic distribution

Widespread; in all but the arid plains states.

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Inflorescences

Inflorescence of 4-8 flowers in terminal heads, heads subessile; involucres of 8-10, lanceolate, leaf-like bracts, longer than the flowers.

Leaves

Leaves 4-6 in a whorl, obovated-cuspidate to elliptic-acute, to 18 mm long, glabrous except for prickles on the margins and midrib on lower surface.

Plant and Stem Features

Annual with numerous prostrate or decumbent spreading stems to 4 dm long, simple or branched, more or less glabrous, 4-angled.

References

Correll, D. S. and M. C. Johnson. 1970. Manual of the Vascular Plants of Texas. Texas Research Foundation, Remer, Texas.

Diggs, G. M., B. L. Lipscomb, and A. J. O'kennon. 1999. Illustrated Flora of North Central Texas. Botanical Research Institute of Texas and Austin College. Fort Worth.

Raford, A. E., H. E. Ahles, and C. R. Bell. 1968. Manual of the Vascular Flora of the Carolinas. University of North Carolina Press. Chapel Hill.

Weakly, A.S. 2004 Flora of the Carolinas, Virginia, and Georgia. University of North Carolina, Draft Copy. 

Species name

Sherardia arvensis L.

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