''Persicaria punctata'' (
syn. ''Polygonum punctatum'') is a species of flowering plant in the
knotweed family known by the common names dotted smartweed and dotted knotweed.
''Persicaria punctata'' is native to the Americas, where it can be found in moist and wet habitat types from
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
to
Argentina
Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...
including the West Indies. It is an extremely variable plant. It may be annual or perennial.
''Persicaria punctata'' grows from a
rhizome and produces decumbent or erect stems which may just exceed one meter (40 cm) in length. The branching stems may root at nodes that come in contact with the substrate. The lance-shaped leaves are up to 15 centimeters long and have
stipule
In botany, a stipule is an outgrowth typically borne on both sides (sometimes on just one side) of the base of a leafstalk (the petiole). Stipules are considered part of the anatomy of the leaf of a typical flowering plant, although in many speci ...
s widened into bristly brown
ochrea
An ochrea (Latin ''ocrea'', greave or protective legging), also spelled ocrea, is a plant structure formed of stipules fused into a sheath surrounding the stem, and is typically found in the Polygonaceae
The Polygonaceae are a family of flow ...
that wrap around the stems. The
inflorescence
An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a Plant stem, stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Morphology (biology), Morphologically, it is the modified part of the shoot of sperma ...
is a number of branching clusters of dotted greenish flowers with white edges, sometimes tinged pink.
Flora of North America, ''Persicaria punctata'' (Elliott) Small, 1903. Dotted smartweed, renouée ponctuée
/ref>
References
External links
Jepson Manual TreatmentCalphotos Photo gallery, University of Californiaphoto of herbarium specimen at Missouri Botanical Garden, collected in Costa Rica in 1983
punctata
Flora of South America
Flora of North America
Flora of the Caribbean
Plants described in 1817
Flora without expected TNC conservation status
{{Polygonaceae-stub