Spring Flora of Oklahoma 
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many as the sepals, or fewer, inserted at the base of the 
sessile ovary, or on a small disk. Ovary usually 1-celled. 
Styles 2-5, distinct. Ovules several or numerous on a 
central placenta. Fruit a capsule. 
Petals deeply 2-cleft or 2-parted. 
Capsule ovoid or oblong, dehiscent by valves. 
I. Alsine. 
Capsule cylindric, commonly curved, dehiscent by 
teeth. II. Cerastium. 
Petals entire or emarginate. 
Styles as many as the sepals, alternate with them. 
III. Sagina. 
Styles fewer than the sepals. IV. Arenaria. 
I. ALSINE (Tourn.) L. 
Mostly annual, generally diffuse herbs, with cymose, 
white flowers. Capsule globose, oval, or oblong. Seeds 
smooth or roughened, globose or compressed. 
1. Alsine media L. Common Chickweed. Annual, weak, tufted, 
much branched, decumbent or ascending, 4'-16' long, glabrous except 
a line of hairs along the stem and branches, the pubescent sepals 
and the sometimes ciliate petioles. Leaves ovate or oval, acute or 
rarely obtuse, the lower often cordate, long. Flowers 2"-4" 
broad, in terminal leafy cymes or also solitary in the axils. Sepals 
oblong, mostly acute, longer than the 2-parted petals. Capsule ovoid, 
longer than the calyx. Seeds rough, sometimes crested. 
In waste places, meadows, and woods. Common. January- 
December. 
II. CERASTIUM L. 
Annual or perennial. Stems diffuse, usually downy. 
Leaves opposite. Flower white, peduncled, in terminal, reg¬ 
ularly forking cymes. Sepals 4-5. Petals 4-5, notched or 
2-cleft. Stamens 10. Styles 5 or less. Capsules cylindri¬ 
cal, 1-celled, many-seeded. 
