| Dicotyledon | Literature for Rumex giganteus
Wagner et al., 1990, 1999. |
| Polygonaceae -- The Buckwheat Family | Bibliography |
| Rumex giganteus | |
Common name(s): dock, sorrel, pawale, uhauhako |
| General Information | ||
|---|---|---|
| Distribution | In the Hawaiian Islands, endemic to Moloka`i, Maui, Hawai`i. | |
| Habit |
Scandent shrubs or lianas; stems usually decumbent or supported by trees in forested areas, sometimes sprawling to suberect in open areas or at high elevations, (8-)20-200 dm long, glabrous or occasionally (Hawai`i) pilose in the inflorescence. |
|
| Leaves |
Leaves not especially thick (occasionally somewhat thickened in open areas or at high elevations on East Maui and Mauna Kea, Hawai`i), dull, oblong-ovate to occasionally deltate, sometimes narrowly oblong-ovate or in open sites smaller and ovate-elliptic, flat, 6-22(-30) cm long, (1.8-)2.5-10(-11.6) cm wide, glabrous or sometimes sparsely short-papillose-pilose, margins entire, rarely slightly undulate, apex acute, acuminate, or occasionally broadly obtuse, base truncate or cordate, occasionally broadly cuneate in smaller leaves in open habitats or at high elevations, petioles 1-7 cm long, glabrous to sparsely pilose. |
|
| Flowers |
Flowers unisexual (and the plants monoecious), the proportions of each sex varying from nearly equal to one type strongly dominating, numerous in large, red or rarely green and sometimes tinged red, diffuse to somewhat congested, many-branched, usually pendent, paniculate inflorescences (15-)25-80 cm or more long, usually 20-30 cm or more wide, rarely narrower; staminate flowers with outer tepals 1-1.2 mm long, the valves reddish or sometimes greenish, membranous, 1.5-1.8 mm long, anthers ca. 1-1.2 mm long; pistillate flowers with outer tepals usually reddish, ca. 1-1.4 mm long, the valves reddish or sometimes yellowish green, membranous, ca. 1.5 mm long, enlarging to 4-5 mm long and becoming cordate in fruit, venation becoming conspicuous, margins denticulate, the faces without tubercles. |
|
| Fruit |
Nuts pale brown, ca. 1.8-2.3 mm long, the 2 sides of a single arm of a mature nut distinctly diverging, the angle ca. 45E, margins of arms with a conspicuous rim. |
|
| Chromosomes |
2n = 54*, ca. 56*, 60* |
|