leaves sessile or nearly so, linear to linear-elliptic or elliptic-lanceolate, somewhat 

 acuminate, minutely puherulent, to 1 dm. long and 3 cm. wide: peduncles often 

 branching, longer than the leaves; spikes slender, 3-10 cm. long, the numerous 

 flowers scattered singly and quite evenly along one side; calyx segments narrowly 

 linear, 5-7 mm. long and less than 1 mm. wide; corolla about 1 cm. long, lips 

 nearly as long as the tube which is saccate near the base, the upper lip truncate 

 or retuse, the lower lip 3-lobed with middle lobe truncate or retuse and the 

 lateral lobe obtuse; stamens slightly exserted, the glabrous filaments attached 

 about midway in the tube and 3-4 mm. long; anther cells unequal, the upper 

 lobe 0.8 mm. long, the lower lobe 1 mm. long and apiculate, the connective 

 broad; ovary 1.5 mm. long. 2-celled, glabrous, ovules 2 in each cell; style 1 cm. 

 long, puherulent at base, the small stigma 2-cleft; capsule 1-1.5 cm. long, the 

 body as long as the stipelike base or shorter; seeds 4, disklike, 2 cm. in diameter, 

 with thickened margins and smooth surface. J. ovata (Walt.) Lindau var. Jan- 

 ceolata (Chapm.) Gl., Dianthera lanceolata (Chapm.) Small. 



In wet and swampy grounds and edge of water along streams, in e. Tex. and 

 s.e. Okla. (McCurtain Co.), Mar.-June; from Fla. to Tex. and Okla., n. to Va. 



Fam. 123. Plantaginaceae Juss. Plantain Family 



Annual or perennial scapose herbs without or with an abbreviated stem; leaves 

 all basal or nearly so; flowers small, perfect or unisexual, hypogynous, regular 

 or slightly irregular in the calyx, in long-peduncled bracted terminal spikes; calyx 

 and corolla 4-divided or -lobed, persistent, usually scarious or scarious-margined; 

 stamens 4 or 2, distinct, inserted on the corolla tube; style filiform, stigmatic 

 for most of its length; ovary superior, 2- to 4-celled; fruit a capsule, 1 to few 

 seeds per cell. 



A family of 3 genera and about 270 species, cosmopolitan in distribution. 



1. Plantago L. Plantain 



Flowers in spikes or heads, each sessile or subsessile in the axil of a bract; 

 sepals 4, the 2 next to the bract often somewhat different from the 2 next to 

 the axis; corolla salverform, long-persistent after anthesis, its tube covering the 

 summit of the capsule, its lobes reflexed and spreading or erect and connivent; 

 capsule circumscissile at or below the middle. 



More than 250 species, widely distributed. 



Species of Plantago are not usually considered to be aquatic or even wetland 

 plants. However, the species we are including, many of which are weedy, are 

 found in springy places, seepage areas, some in salt marshes and in ditches and 

 streams in water or in wet situations, although most of the species may also be 

 found in dry areas. 



1. Bracts scarious except at base and in center, ovate and abruptly narrowed into 

 a long scarious tip 1. P- lanceolata. 



1. Bracts scarious-margined or wholly herbaceous, without slender scarious 



tips (2) 



2(1). Sepals and bracts glabrous; spikes 2-4 mm. thick in flower (3) 



2. Sepals and bracts pubescent or villous; spikes 3.5-1 2 mm. thick in flower (6) 



3(2). Leaf blades elliptic to ovate, more than 1.5 cm. wide; stamens 4 (4) 



3. Leaf blades linear to narrowly oblanceolate, less than 1.5 cm. wide; stamens 



2 (9) 



4(3). Corolla lobes definitely more than 1 mm. long; bracts and sepals without 

 keels; capsules ovoid 2. P. eriopoda. 



1533 



