Flora of New Zealand Series

fumitory

Tufted or scrambling annual herb. Lvs crowded to distant; lamina dissected, pale, glaucous, up to 8 × 4 cm; segments linear or linear-lanceolate, occasionally narrowly cuneiform. Infl. dense, becoming lax at fruiting, with (10)-20-40 fls; rachis > peduncle, especially at fruiting. Peduncles stout, 1-3 cm long; bracts oblong, pale, membranous, pink at tips, < pedicels, 1-2 × 0.5-0.8 mm. Sepals ovate to narrow-ovate, dentate, acute, 2-2.5 × 0.7-1 mm. Corolla purplish pink with dark green and purple tips, (6)-7-8-(9) mm long; lower petal spoon-shaped with widely-spreading margins at tip. Fr. broadly obovoid, broader than long, c. 2 × 2.5 mm, rugose when dry; apex truncate to retuse; apical pits small.

N.; S.: throughout but apparently uncommon except in Canterbury and Otago.

Europe, Asia Minor, N. Africa 1870

Cultivated fields, waste places, gardens.