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DESCRIPTION:
Fluvellins are branched, mat-forming perennial broadleaf weeds that infest ditchbanks,
roadsides, and cultivated crops in northern and coastal California. Plants
prefer moist, sandy soils and mature from
June through September. Seedlings have heart-shaped, gray-green cotyledons (seed leaves) 1
to 1.2 times as long as broad and covered with fine, short hairs. The first
true leaves are oval and have smooth margins.
Mature K. spuria (female fluvellin) leaves are nearly round or egg shaped, 1 to 1.5 inches
(2.5 - 3.7 cm) wide, and grow
on short stalks. Mature K. elatine (sharppoint fluvellin) has arrowhead shaped leaves. Single
slender stalks dispersed along the stem bear 0.3 to 0.5 inch (7.5 - 13 mm) long
flowers with two lips, the upper violet and the lower
yellow. When ripe, seed capsules open to release round, brown seeds with honeycomblike
surfaces.
Broadleaf ID illustration.
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