Pilea insolens - Insolent Clearweed

Insolent Clearweed is a perennial herb, with runners. Stems are simple, 20-50 cm tall, soft, fleshy; internodes long. Leaf-stalk is strongly unequal in length, up to 5 cm or absent; leaf blade below pale green, above green, the major blade oblong-ovate, asymmetric, strongly unequal in shape and size, sometimes reduced into alternate leaves, 5-13 x 3-6 cm, membranous, 3-veined, basal lateral veins U-shaped near origin, lateral veins many, regularly transverse, netveined, cystoliths minute, shortly spindle-shaped, prominent on both surfaces. Base is distinctly peltate or deeply heart-shaped in basfixed leaves, margin entire or with a few small teeth near tip, tip with a tail-tapering; the minor blade ovate, 1.5-4 x 0.8-2 cm, base deeply heart-shaped, almost around stem, or nearly flat, margin entire but with a few small teeth near tip, tip pointed. Male inflorescence is spikelike, somewhat coiled distally, few branched, 5-14 cm, flowers or glomerules loosely arranged along 1 side of axis; female inflorescence a cymose panicle, much branched, to 5 cm; bracts triangular-ovate, about 3 mm. Male flowers are about 2.5 mm; flower-stalk thin, about 2 mm; tepals 4, ovate, fused for about 1/2 length, tip with a tail; stamens 4. Female tepals are unequal, lower lobe hooded, about 1/2 as long as achene, lateral 2 lobes triangular-ovate, about 1/2 as long as lower lobe, membranous. Insolent Clearweed is found in shaded moist places in evergreen and broad-leaved mixed forests, near streams, at altitudes of 1600-2700 m, from Nepal to East Himalaya. Flowering: June-August.