Botanical name: Stemodia verticillata    Family: Plantaginaceae (Plantain family)
Synonyms: Stemodia humilis, Lindenbergia petelotii, Lendneria humilis

Whorled Twintip is an annual herb, with stems clustered, erect, up to 14 cm high, much branched, densely hairy. Flowers are borne in leaf-axils, solitary. Flowers are blue-purple, 5.5 mm long; tube cylindric, 3-4 mm long, pale green, with longitudinal dull purple lines; upper lip 2- lobed at tip, with club-shaped hairs at base; lower lip 2 mm across, with obovate-round lobes, midlobe broader than lateral ones. Filaments are hairless, anterior pair 1.5-2 mm long, posterior pair shorter; posterior anther-cells unequally paired. Flower-stalks are 1 mm long. Sepals are nearly equal, linear-lanceshaped, 2.5-3.5 x 0.6 mm, tapering at tip, minutely glandular-bristly outside. Lower leaves are opposite, upper ones in whorls of 3, broadly ovate, 0.7-1.5 x 0.4-1.4 cm, flat at base, somewhat pointed at tip, coarsely rounded toothed-sawtoothed, dotted above. Leaf-stalks are 3-10 mm long, densely and minutely glandular-bristly. Capsule round, 2.5-3 x 3 mm, biconvex, shorter than sepal-cup, hairless, 4-valved; seeds cuneiform, 0.5 mm long, flat at both ends, longitudinally ribbed, netveined in between ribs, dark brown. Whorled Twintip is native to S. Mexico to Tropical America, naturalized in India and elsewhere. Flowering: March-April.

Your name:
Your email:
Your comments
The flower labeled Whorled Twintip is ...