Aquatic and Wetland Vascular Plants of the Northern Great Plains

Stellaria L. -- Stitchwort

Low, spreading or erect perennials (in those treated here), mostly glabrous; stems slender, 4-angled. Flowers solitary in forks of the stem or in rather sparsely flowered terminal cymes; pedicels filiform. Sepals green with scarious margins; petals white, bilobed to deeply cleft; stamens 10 or sometimes fewer; carpels 3, styles 3. Fruit an ovoid or oblong capsule, laterally dehiscent by 6 valves.

  
References:

Chinnappa, C. C. and J. K. Morton.  1976.  Studies on the
     Stellaria longipes Goldie complex -- variation in 
     wild populations.  Rhodora 78:488-502. 

Porsild, A. E.  1963.  Stellaria longipes Goldie and its allies 
     in North America.  Natl. Mus. Canada Bull. 186:1-35.

Lead Characteristic Go To

1 Flowers solitary in forks of the stem, not subtended by scarious bracts. S. crassifolia

1 Flowers in terminal cymes, subtended by small scarious bracts. Lead 2

2 Inflorescence widely branched,the pedicels spreading reflexed with age; leaves spreading to ascending, widest at or above the middle. S. longifolia

2 Inflorescence rather narrow, the pedicels erect to ascending; leaves strongly ascending, widest near the base. S. longipes

14. Caryophyllaceae, the Pink Family

3. Stellaria L. -- Stitchwort

1. Stellaria crassifolia Ehrh.

2. Stellaria longifolia Muhl. ex Willd. -- Long-leaved stitchwort

3. Stellaria longipes Goldie

Return to Family -- Caryophyllaceae - The Pink Family
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Lead	Characteristic	Go To
1	Flowers solitary in forks of the stem, not subtended by scarious bracts.	S. crassifolia
1	Flowers in terminal cymes, subtended by small scarious bracts.	Lead 2
2	Inflorescence widely branched,the pedicels spreading reflexed with age; leaves spreading to ascending, widest at or above the middle.	S. longifolia
2	Inflorescence rather narrow, the pedicels erect to ascending; leaves strongly ascending, widest near the base.	S. longipes