1. Batis maritima L. Vidrillos. Fig. 429. 



Plant pale-green, shrublike, strong-scented, with spreading or prostrate often 

 creeping stems to 15 dm. long, the stem commonly rooting at tip and forming 

 large colonies; leaves curved, to 25 mm. long; spikes ovoid-cylindric, 5-10 mm. 

 long; bracts reniform to suborbicular, often apiculate; fruit ovoid to oblong- 

 ellipsoid, 1-2 cm. long, short-stalked, drooping. 



In salt flats and along muddy flats of the seashore in s. Tex., June-Aug.; 

 widespread on coastal strands in this hemisphere and in H.I. 



Fam. 55. Phytolaccaceae R. Br. Pokeweed Family 



Herbs, shrubs, vines or trees, with alternate entire or somewhat undulate 

 mostly exstipulate leaves and perfect or unisexual flowers; calyx 4- or 5-parted, 

 its segments imbricated in bud; petals wanting; stamens as many as the calyx 

 segments and alternate with them, sometimes more numerous, hypognous or 

 epigynous, the filaments distinct or united at base; anthers 2-celled, the sacs 

 longitudinally dehiscent, often nearly separated; ovary several-celled in most of 

 the genera; fruit various. 



About 100 species in 12 or more genera, mostly in the tropics. 



1. Phytolacca L. 



About 35 species in tropical and warm-temperate regions. 



1. Phytolacca americana L. Pokeweed, pokeberry, scoke. Fig. 429A. 



Plant glabrous, with an unpleasant odor and a large poisonous perennial root- 

 stock (to 15 cm. in diameter) from which arise stout purplish leafy stalks to 3 m. 

 tall; leaves typically elliptic-lanceolate but sometimes ovate-lanceolate, cuneate 

 or sometimes broadly rounded at base, acuminate at apex, to about 25 cm. long 

 and 1 dm. wide; pedicels about 1 cm. long, with 1 or more bracteoles about the 

 middle; sepals 5, white or pinkish, suborbicular, petaloid, 2-3 mm. long; stamens 

 and styles 10, the ovaries green; berries in long lax racemes, dark-purple, 8-10 

 mm. in diameter. P. decandra L., P. rigida Small. 



In rich low ground, especially in recent clearings and along roadsides in and 

 about depressions, tanks and ponds, in e. half of Okla., throughout most of Tex., 

 and Ariz. (Cochise and Santa Cruz cos.), July-Oct.; from Fla. to Tex., n. to 

 N.E., s. Que., N.Y. and s. Ont. 



The very young sprouts, when properly and safely prepared, are used as a 

 potherb; otherwise, they should not be eaten. Phytolacca rigida is described as 

 having permanently erect, not nodding, fruiting racemes and a berry longer, not 

 shorter, than its stalk. 



Fam. 56. Aizoaceae Rudolphi Carpet-weed Family 



Annual or perennial often succulent herbs with stems mostly prostrate or 

 ascending; leaves opposite or whorled, entire, with the base of the petioles 

 sometimes dilated; stipules none or (when present) scarious; flowers solitary or 

 clustered in the axils, regular and perfect; calyx 4- or 5-lobed or -parted, the 

 tube free or adnate to the ovary; petals none (in ours); stamens few to many, 

 inserted on the floral cup or hypogynous, the 2-celled anthers oblong or linear; 

 ovary 1- to 20-celled, superior or only half-superior in Sesuvium; styles as many 

 as the cells of the ovary; fruit a thin-walled capsule, dehiscing loculicidally or 

 septicidally; seeds mostly numerous. 



870 



