Citation: -veneris, L., Sp. Pl. 256 (1753).

Synonymy: Not Applicable

Common name: Shepherds needle.

Description:
Nearly glabrous annual, 15-50 cm high; stem erect, branched, striate, more or less pubescent with short scattered hairs, becoming hollow when old; leaves 2- or 3-pinnate, oblong or narrowly deltoid, with short linear lobes; involucre usually absent.

Rays of umbel 1-3; bracteoles of involucel c. 5, simple or irregularly divided, entire or dentate; pedicels elongating and becoming thickened in fruit; flowers c. 1 mm diam., subsessile; 3 outer petals larger than the 2 others.

Fruit linear-oblong, 15-80 mm long, the strongly dorsally, compressed beak obviously distinct from the seed-bearing part of the fruit; carpophore entire, persistent; mericarps slightly laterally compressed, distinctly 5-ribbed.

Published illustration: Ross-Craig (1958) Drawings Brit. Pl. 12:t. 34.

Distribution:  A weed in fields, on wasteland and roadsides.   Native to Europe, the Mediterranean region, and eastwards to the western Himalaya. Conservation status: naturalised Flowering time: Sept. — Dec.

SA Distribution Map based on current data relating to specimens held in the State Herbarium of South Australia

Biology: No text

Author: Not yet available