What are the characteristics of Stylidium? A comprehensive guide to this plant

Morphological characteristics of Stylidium

A small annual herb, 5-13 cm tall. The leaves are all basal, with very short petioles, ovate-round, ovate to obovate, 5-8 mm long, with a rounded or blunt apex, entire, hairless, and with inconspicuous veins. The stems are 1-3, leafless, unbranched, or dichotomously branched, with sparse short glandular hairs on the upper part. The inflorescence is a long, lax spike. The flowers are small, sessile; the bracts are ovate, less than 1 mm long; the calyx tube (ovary) is narrow and elongated, sparsely covered with glandular hairs, the lobes are small, the front 2 are fused into a single lobe that is shallowly 2-lobed at the apex, 1.8 mm long, and the remaining 3 are linear, 1.2 mm long; the corolla is white, about 2 mm long, with a short tube, the front lobe is very small, ovate, reflexed into a lip, the other 4 spread backward, the rearmost 2 are longer, 2-lobed at the apex, with appendages at the base; the column is 3.5 mm long, exserted; the ovary is 2-locular. The capsule is slender and cylindrical, about 8 mm long.

Distribution of Stylidium

Produced along the coast of Guangdong. It also occurs in Sri Lanka and Queensland in northeastern Australia. It grows in moist grasslands by streams in hilly areas.