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Cotula myriophylloides

Overview

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Critically Endangered

Threat status

Interesting Facts

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Description

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Family Compositae

The largest family of flowering plants , the Compositae (Asteraceae), comprising about 1,100 genera and more than 20,000 species and characterized by many small flowers arranged in a head looking like a single flower and subtended by an involucre of bracts. A head may consist of both ray flowers and disk flowers, as in the sunflower, of disk flowers only, as in the burdock, or of ray flowers only, as in the dandelion.

Genus Cotula

Annuals or perennials , 2-25[-50+] cm (sometimes aromatic ). Stems usually 1, erect or prostrate to decumbent or ascending (sometimes rooting at nodes), usually branched, glabrous or ± strigillose to villous (hairs mostly basifixed ). Leaves usually mostly cauline [basal]; alternate [opposite]; petiolate or sessile; blades obovate or spatulate to lanceolate or linear , sometimes 1-3-pinnately [palmati-pinnately] lobed , ultimate margins entire or irregularly toothed , faces glabrous or ± strigillose to villous [lanate ] (hairs mostly basifixed). Heads disciform [discoid or radiate ], borne singly (peduncles sometimes dilated ). Involucres broadly hemispheric to saucer-shaped , 3-12+[-15+] mm diam. Phyllaries persistent , 13-30+ in 2-3+ series, margins and apices (colorless, light to dark brown, or purplish) scarious . Receptacles flat to convex [conic], epaleate (sometimes ± covered with persistent stalks of florets ). Ray florets 0 [5-8+, pistillate , fertile ; corollas white] (peripheral pistillate florets 8-80+ in 1-3+ series; corollas usually none). Disc florets 12-200+[-600+], bisexual , fertile [functionally staminate ]; corollas ochroleucous or yellow, tubes ± cylindric (bases sometimes adaxially saccate ), throats abruptly ampliate , lobes (3-) 4, ± deltate (sometimes one larger than others, usually each with central resin canal). Cypselae obovoid to oblong , ob-compressed or -flattened, ribs 2, lateral , sometimes becoming wings , faces ± papillate (pericarps relatively thin, sometimes with myxogenic cells and/or 2 lateral resin sacs ) ; pappi 0. x = 10.

Species 55: introduced ; s Old World; introduced also (perhaps some native ) in Mexico, South America, s Oceanic Islands .

Some species of Cotula are widely naturalized . F. Hrusa et al. (2002) reported Cotula mexicana (de Candolle) Cabrera as established on golf courses in California; it is similar to C. australis and differs in leaf blades mostly 1-pinnate, receptacles pilose , and disc florets functionally staminate.[1]

Habitat

Biome: Freshwater[2].

Ecology: Primarily seasonal Coastal Pools . Altitude up to 2,000 m. Mostly in brackish water but also in fresh water . Growing in still or slowly moving water, sometimes forming floating mats. It is also found in marshes and on wet sand. It is usually annual , but in deep water , it may perennial . Flowers from April to June.

Pollinated by insects and is self incompatible, frequently setting no seed outside its range . Disseminules flattened cypselas without a pappus, perhaps dispersed by adhesion to animals. It has been reported to be a weed in drainage channels . It is a decorative plant.[2].

List of Habitats :

Taxonomy

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Notes

Name Status: Accepted Name .

Comment: Data Providers: African Flowering Plants Database , SANBI, Govaerts World Compositae Checklist A-G, Tropicos. GCC LSID: urn :lsid:compositae.org:names:0F39F984-E69F-4A93-B1C1-BC2389A76032

Last scrutiny: 12-Aug-09

Similar Species

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Members of the genus Cotula

ZipcodeZoo has pages for 10 species, subspecies, varieties, forms, and cultivars in this genus:

C. australis (Australian Waterbuttons) · C. bipinnata (Ferny Cotula) · C. coronopifolia (Bachelors Buttons) · C. coronopifolia 'Cream Buttons' (Brassbuttons) · C. hemisphaerica (Pin-Cushion Weed) · C. hispida (Goudknopjes) · C. matricarioides (Pineapple Weed) · C. mexicana (Mexican Brassbuttons) · C. pilulifera (Stinknet) · C. prostrata (Yerba De Tago)

More Info

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Further Reading

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Notes

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Contributors

Identifiers

Footnotes

  1. Linda E. Watson "Cotula". in Flora of North America Vol. 19, 20 and 21 Page 52, 486, 543, 544. Oxford University Press. Online at EFloras.org. [back]
  2. Helme, N. & Raimondo, D. 2010. Cotula myriophylloides. In: IUCN 2011. IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2011.2. <www.iucnredlist.org>. Downloaded on 31 January 2012. [back]
Last Revised: 7/24/2012