Graceful Pouzolz's Bush

Pouzolzia zeylanica was misidentified as Parietaria officinalis Linnaeus by J. K. Small.

A perennial, 20-40 cm tall, erect to suberect, hairy to glabrescent herb. Leaves opposite or rarely alternate, with 4-12 mm long petiole; lamina lanceolate-rhomboid ovate, 1-2.5 cm long, 4-15 mm broad, cuneate or subtruncate at the base, entire, acute; stipules broadly ovate, c. 4-5 mm long, c. 3-4 mm broad, acuminate, ciliate. Flowers pale green, in loose axillary clusters, covered with simple or uncinate hairs, female sessile, male with c. 2 mm long pedicel. Calyx 4-lobed and gibbous in male; 4-toothed in female flowers. Stamens 4. Achenes ovate, c. 1.5 mm long, shining black, enveloped by ribbed calyx.

Plants 1-20 dm, sparsely to moderately covered on all parts with appressed and spreading hairs. Leaf blades 1-5 × 0.6-2 cm, base rounded to broadly cuneate, apex acute or nearly acuminate. Staminate flowers ca. 3 mm across; filaments longer than tepals; pistillode elongate, knoblike. Pistillate flowers ca. 1-1.5 mm, tepals ribbed. Achenes ca. (0.9-)1.2 × ca. 0.6 mm, base truncate.

Herbs perennial, erect or ascending, rarely prostrate, almost simple or few branched at base, 12-40 cm tall; rootstock often tuberous; branches sometimes with short branchlets, strigillose. Leaves often opposite, sometimes alternate on lower or upper stems; stipules triangular, 2-6 mm; petiole 0.2-1.8 cm; leaf blade ovate or broadly ovate, lanceolate or narrowly lanceolate, usually 1.2-9 × (0.6-)0.8-3 cm, smallest ones on short branchlets, herbaceous, secondary vein 1 or 2 pairs, abaxial surface sparsely or sometimes densely strigillose or strigose along veins, adaxial surface glabrous or sparsely strigillose; base cuneate to rounded, rarely subcordate, margin entire, apex subobtuse, acuminate, or shortly so. Glomerules often bisexual, 2.5-5 mm in diam., bisexual ones in nodes of proximal leaves, female in distal axils; bracts triangular, 2-3 mm, ciliate. Male flowers: perianth lobes 4, narrowly oblong or oblong-oblanceolate, connate to middle, 1.2-1.5 mm, puberulent, apex acute or cuspidate. Female perianth tube ellipsoid or rhombic, 0.8-1 mm, 1.5-1.8 mm in fruit, puberulent, inconspicuously ca. 9-ribbed or 4-winged, apex 2-toothed. Achenes white, light to dark yellow or light brown, ovoid, 1-1.2 mm. Fl. Jul-Aug, fr. Aug-Oct.

Himalaya, India, Ceylon, Burma, east to China and S. Japan, Malaysia.

Distribution: Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka (Ceylon), Burma, Malayasia and China.

introduced; Fla.; Asia.

S Anhui, Fujian, S Gansu, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi, Sichuan, Taiwan, E and S Yunnan, W Zhejiang [India, Indonesia, Japan, Kashmir, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Papua New Guinea, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam; Australia, Maldives, Polynesia, Yemen (Socotra); introduced in Africa and the New World].

200-2400 m

Fl.Per.: July-October.

Flowering late summer-winter.

Roadsides, old fields, waste places, disturbed areas; 0-20m.

Grasslands, thickets by streams, wet places, sunny and somewhat moist places by rice fields; 100-800(-1300) m.

Parietaria zeylanica Linnaeus, Sp. Pl. 2: 1052. 1753