Northeast Wetland Flora
Field Office Guide to Plant Species
Rhexia virginica L.
- Family: Meadow-beauty (Melastomaceae)
- Flowering: July-September
- Field Marks: This attractive species differs from others in the genus by its sharply toothed leaves, wing-angled stems, and presence of tubers.
- Habitat: Wet meadows.
- Habit: Perennial herb from tubers.
- Stems: Upright, branched or unbranched, wing-angled, square, sometimes spongy near the base, smooth or sparsely bristly, up to 3 feet tall.
- Leaves: Opposite, simple, oval to broadly lanceolate, pointed at the tip, rounded at the sessile base, sharply toothed, bristly-ciliate, strongly 3- to 5-nerved, up to 3 inches long, up to 1 1/2 inches wide.
- Flowers: Few in a terminal inflorescence; each flower on a glandular-hairy stalk.
- Sepals: 4, united below to form a tube up to 1/2 inch long, green, the tube attached to the ovary, glandular-hairy.
- Petals: 4, free from each other, crimson to bright purple, 1/2-1 inch long.
- Stamens: 8, elongated, yellow, with a minute spur on the back.
- Pistils: Ovary superior.
- Fruits: Capsule flask-shaped, swollen at the base, up to 1 inch long; seeds numerous.
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