Coastal Plain Milkwort

Polygala setacea Michx. Fl. Bor. Am. 2: 52. 1803
Stems solitary or usually several from a slender perpendicular probably perennial root, very slender, simple or sparsely branched, 1.8-3.3 dm. high; leaves scattered, scale-like, ovatesubulate to linear-subulate, 0.5-2 mm. long, 0.5 mm. wide or less, mucronate; peduncles 12 mm. long or less; racemes cylindric, acute, densely flowered, 3-6 mm. thick, the axis 8-24 mm. long; bracts ovate-lanceolate, deciduous, 1 mm. long; pedicels 0.3-0.7 mm. long; flowers white; sepals broadly ovate to narrowly lanceolate, obtuse to acuminate, glabrous, .1.3-1.5 mm. long; wings obovate or elliptic-obovate, 1.6-2 mm. long, 0.7-1.1 mm. wide, obtusish or abruptly short-pointed but with obtuse apex, cuneate at base, 3-nerved; keel 1.8 mm. long, the crest on each side of 2-3 entire or bifid lobes; stamens 6, the filaments united in 3's nearly to apex; capsule ovate, obscurely cordate at base, short-stipitate, 1.8 mm. long, 1.5 mm. wide; seed subglobose-pyriform, short-rostrate at base, rounded at apex, densely short-pilose, 1.2-1.4 mm. long (including aril); aril cellular, equitant, erect, 0.5-0.7 mm. high, fastened to tip of beak of seed, its 2 rounded lobes touching the seed-body near base.
Type locality: North Carolina.
Distribution: North Carolina to Florida.

Polygala setacea, commonly known as the coastal plain milkwort, is a flowering plant. A perennial, it lives for about three years and may not flower its first year. It grows in the southeastern United States. It has scale-like leaves and white flowers. It grows in flatwoods.