Western Wetland Flora
Field Office Guide to Plant Species
Tamarix chinensis Loureiro
- Family: Tamarisk (Tamaricaceae)
- Flowering: May-September
- Field Marks: All species of Tamarix are very much alike. This one differs from the rest by its sepals not being toothed and more or less united at the base.
- Habitat: Floodplains of rivers, disturbed areas.
- Habit: Tree up to 15 feet tall.
- Stems: Trunks and twigs brown to black, smooth.
- Leaves: Alternate, simple, nearly scale-like, up to 1/8 inch long.
- Flowers: Many crowded into racemes up to 3 inches long; flowers borne on stalks about 1/16 inch long, subtended by a bract about 1/16 inch long.
- Sepals: 5, green, more or less united at the base, up to 1/16 inch long.
- Petals: 5, pink, free from each other, up to 1/16 inch long.
- Stamens: 5.
- Pistils: Ovary superior.
- Fruits: Capsules ellipsoid, smooth: each seed with a tuft of hairs at the tip.
- Notes: This species is native to China and Japan, but has escaped from cultivation into the floodplains of rivers and disturbed areas. Birds reportedly use this species for nesting.
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Return to Species List -- Group 5
Next Species -- Saltcedar (Tamarix ramosissima)
