''Cardamine corymbosa'', commonly known as the New Zealand bitter-cress, is a flowering plant in the family Brassicaceae. Native to the subantarctic islands of Australasia, it has become an

invasive species An invasive species otherwise known as an alien is an introduced organism that becomes overpopulated and harms its new environment. Although most introduced species are neutral or beneficial with respect to other species, invasive species ad ...

in plant nurseries. The

specific epithet In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

refers to the structure of the inflorescence.Flora of Australia Online.

Description

New Zealand bittercress was described by Hooker as “a small and very distinct species of ''Cardamine'', wiry and fragile in every part’’. The plant has a low and spreading growth habit with unbranched stems which creep along the ground. It produces daughter plants through rooting at the nodes. The basal, compound

leaves A leaf (plural, : leaves) is any of the principal appendages of a vascular plant plant stem, stem, usually borne laterally aboveground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", wh ...

have three to five leaflets, with the terminal leaflet being up to twice as large as the lateral ones.

Distribution and habitat

The plant is native to New Zealand’s subantarctic Auckland and Campbell Islands, as well as to

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

’s Macquarie Island, where it occurs in

alpine tundra Alpine tundra is a type of natural region or biome that does not contain trees because it is at high elevation, with an associated alpine climate, harsh climate. As the latitude of a location approaches the poles, the threshold elevation for alp ...

and rocky coastal habitats. It has been accidentally introduced to other parts of the world, including

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

and Europe, where it is a weed of nursery crops grown in polytunnels.Post ''et al''. (2009). Cardamine corymbosa wurzel

References

Sources

* * * corymbosa Flora of Macquarie Island Flora of New Zealand Flora of the Auckland Islands Flora of the Campbell Islands Plants described in 1844 Taxa named by Joseph Dalton Hooker {{Brassicales-stub