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Manual of the New Zealand Flora.
6. Limosella, Linn
6. Limosella, Linn.
Small tufted creeping glabrous marsh or aquatic plants. Leaves opposite or fascicled at the nodes, rarely alternate on barren shoots, long-petioled, linear or spathulate, quite entire. Flowers minute, axillary, solitary. Calyx campanulate, 5-toothed or-lobed. Corolla campanulate or almost rotate; tube short; lobes 5, nearly equal. Stamens 4; filaments filiform; anther-cells confluent. Ovary 2-celled at the base; style short; stigma clavate or subcapitate. Capsule obscurely dehiscent or septicidally 2-valved; valves thin, membranous. Seeds numerous, small, ovoid, transversely rugulose.
A genus comprising 6 or 7 species, found in most parts of the world.
Leaves ½–1½ in. long; lamina not much broader than the petiole. Flowers pedicelled; corolla and capsule longer than the calyx 1. L. tenuifolia. Leaves 2–5 in. long; lamina ovate, suddenly contracted into the slender petiole. Flowers sessile; corolla and capsule shorter than the calyx 2. L. Curdieana.
| 1. | L. tenuifolia, Nutt. Gen. N. Amer. ii. 43.—Annual or perennial, creeping and tufted, often forming patches 1–2 in. diam. or more. Leaves densely fascicled, ½–1½ in. long, rarely more, narrow-linear or linear-subulate, often with little or no distinction between petiole and blade, but sometimes dilated towards the tip and becoming narrow linear-spathulate. Flowers minute, 1/12 in. diam., axillary, on very short pedicels. Calyx 5-toothed. Corolla rather longer than the calyx; lobes ovate-oblong. Capsule ovoid-globose, exceeding the calyx when mature.—L. australis, R. Br. Prodr. 443. L. aquatica var. tenuifolia, Hook, f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 190; Handb. N.Z. Fl 204. L. ciliata, Col. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xxi. (1889) 96.
North and South Islands: Common in wet places throughout. Sea-level to 3000 ft. November–February. Often considered to be a variety of the widely diffused L. aquatica, Linn., but the leaves have not the conspicuous lamina of that species, and the whole plant is usually much smaller. It also occurs in Australia and Tasmania, in temperate North and South America, and in some parts of Europe. |
| 2. | L. Curdieana, F. Muell. Fragm. Phyt. Austral. ix. 166.—A perennial herb with tufts of radical leaves, emitting short thick stolons terminating in other tufts, glabrous in all its parts. Leaves numerous; petiole 2–4 in. long or more, filiform, terete, dilated towards the base; blade ¼–¾ in. long, ovate or ovate-oblong, obtuse, suddenly contracted into the petiole, rather thin; main veins 3–5, parallel, with reticulating veinlets between. Flowers crowded at the bases of the petioles, sessile, minute. Calyx 1/10 in. long or less, tipped with 5 minute teeth. Corolla altogether included in the
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calyx, shortly 5-lobed. Stamens 4, inserted on the corolla-tube. Style short; stigma capitate. Capsule included within the persistent calyx, 1/10–⅛ in diam., globose, rupturing irregularly. Seeds very numerous; testa reticulated.
South Island: Otago—Watery places in the Manuherikia Valley, Petrie. Also in Australia. A very curious plant, differing from all states of L. aquatica in the sessile flowers, included corolla, and capsule shorter than the calyx. I have seen no specimens except Mr. Petrie's, the flowers of which appear to be cleistogamic. |