PLATE 527. 



CONYZA INCISA, Ait. (Fl. Cap. Vol. Ill, p. 113). 

 Natural Order COMPOSITE. 



A low growing much branched plant with yellow flower-heads. Stems 

 herbaceous, terete, multistriate, pilose with white cellular hairs, and glandular 

 with minute stalked glands, more or less viscid, much branched in upper portion. 

 Leaves petiolate, lower ones largest, the petiole concave above, usually eared at 

 base, the two ears appearing like stipules ; a short distance above them are two 

 depauperated sessile leaflets. 2 to 3-lines long, 1 to 2-lines broad, and frequently 

 above them, and just below the lamina are a pair of larger ones reaching to f inch 

 long, 4 to 6 lines broad, deeply incised on the margins ; the terminal lobe (or true 

 leaf) being 1 to 2 inches long, \ to \\ inch broad, deeply and very irregularly 

 inciso-dentate, the whole simulating a compound leaf, upper leaves similar, but 

 smaller. Heads heterogamous, very loosely corymbose, on long and often naked, 

 erect branches ; discoid. Involucral scales many, in several rows, linear to linear- 

 lanceolate, pilose and glandular, dark tipped ; receptacle honeycombed, margins of 

 cells toothed, more deeply so in those of central florets ; marginal florets female, 

 in many rows, their corollas filiform, minutely 2-3-toothed at apex; central florets 

 fewer, perfect, their corollas tubular, swollen above, and 5-toothed at apex ; 

 filaments more or less curved, slender; anthers obtuse at base. Style of the 

 female florets very slender, 2-toothed, of perfect florets larger, 2-lobed, the lobes 

 minutely hispid. Pappus uniseriate of many slender rough bristles. Achenes of 

 marginal florets minutely thickened at margin, compressed, those of central florets 

 5-ribbed, all glabrous. 



Habitat: NATAL: Coast districts and up to at least 2000 feet alt., Inanda 

 1800 feet alt. Wood 1110; without precise locality Gerrard $ McKen 338; 339. 

 Also in Cape Colony, and probably in the other Colonies also. 



The genus Conyza includes about 50 species, mostly in tropical and sub- 

 tropical countries, very few in temperate regions. In South Africa there are 14 

 species as enumerated in the Index Kewensis, of which at least 6 are found in 

 Natal. None of the Natal species are of any importance, nor are they used in any 

 way so far as known to us, except that G. ivaefolia, (Less} has been used in Cape 

 Colony by the natives, mixed with other ingredients as a remedy for gall sickness 

 in cattle. 



Fig. 1, Flowering branch, upper portion; 2, involucre; 3, female floret; 

 4, style of same ; 5, achene ; 6, perfect floret ; 7, style of same ; 8, three of the 

 stamens; 9, achene of perfect floret; except fig 1, all enlarged. 



