POLYGONACEE. (BUCKWHEAT FAMILY.) 105 
2, A.umbellata, Lamb. (Pink Sand-Verbena.) Annual; stems decumbent, leaves 
ablony or ovate, attenuate at base into slender petioles; flowers pink. 
3. A- maritima, Nutt. (Red Sand-Verbena.) Stouter than the last; leaves broader 
with shorter petioles; involucral bracts ovate; flowers bright red. From Santa Barbara 
southward. 
4. 4 tragrans, Nuit, of the Columbia River, has white flowers. 
Five other species belonging to this western genus are found east of the Sierra Nevada. 
Orver 50. POLYGONACEA. 
Herbs, with alternate entire leaves, and stipules in the form of sheaths, or obsolete, 
above the swollen joints of the stem; the flowers mostly perfect, with a more or less per- 
sistent calyx, a l-celled ovary, bearing 2 or 4 styles or stigmas, and u single seed. 
Stamens 4-12 inserted on the base of the 3-6-cleft calyx. 
1. POLYGONUM, L. 
Calyx 5 parted; the divisions petal-like, persistent in fruit, and surrounding the 
usually 3-angled akene. Stamens 3 to 8. Styles or stigmas 2 or 3. Herbs with siall 
flowers on jointed pedicels. 
Knot-weed or Yard-grass and Smart-weed belong to this genus. About 20 species are 
found in California, of which 2 or 3 are probably introduced weeds. 
2. RUMBEX, L. 
Calyx of 6 sepals; the three outer herbaceous, spreading in fruit; the three inner 
larger somewhat petaloid, covering the akene in fruit (then called valves), and often 
bearing grainlike appendages on the outside. Stamens 6. ‘Styles 3; stigmas tufted. 
Introduced weeds with small greenish flowers crowded and whorled in panicled racemes. 
The Docks and Sheep-sorrel are examples of this genus. Of the dozen species on 
this coast, half are introduced weeds. 
3. CRIOGONUM, Michx. 
Flowers borne in 4 many-to-few-flowered calyx-like involucre of united bracts; the 
pedicels exserted, jointed to the flower, with bractlets at the base. Calyx coroila-uke; 
6-parted or deeply 6-clett. Stamens 9. Akene triangular.—Herbaceous or somewhat 
woody plants, usually with a woolly or scurfy pubescence; the entire leaves without 
stipules and mostly radical; juice frequently acid. Over 80 species grow west of the 
Mississippi, of which 50 are Californian, mostly Alpine. 
Chorizanthe is a similar ‘genus, in which the involucres are 1-flowered and rigid. 
Orders Amarantacee and Uhenopodiacea ere represented by homely introduced ana native weeds. Many 
of the latter order belong to the genus Chenopodium, viz.. Goosefoot, Lamb’s-quarters, Pigwees, Jerusalem 
