Flora of the Hawaiian Islands
Dicotyledon Literature for Spermolepis hawaiiensis
Wagner et al., 1990, 1999.
   Apiaceae -- The Parsley Family Bibliography
      Spermolepis hawaiiensis
General Information
DistributionIn the Hawaiian Islands, endemic to Kaua`i, O`ahu, Moloka`i, Lana`i, Maui, Hawai`i.

Apiaceae - Spermolepis hawaiiensis















Click here for detailed USGS map by Jonathan Price
Habit
Slender, erect annual herbs 0.5-2 dm tall, from a slender taproot; stems few-branched above, essentially glabrous.
Leaves
Leaves ternately decompound, oblong to ovate(?), the basal ones soon withering, 1-4 cm long, the ultimate divisions linear to linear-lanceolate, 3-6 mm long, scaberulous-margined, apex acute, the lowest divisions long-petiolate; cauline leaves smaller, less divided, sessile, basal petioles slender, 2-3 cm long, tapering into a narrow, scarious-margined sheath.
Flowers
Flowers in lax compound umbels arising opposite the upper leaves, peduncles 1-3 cm long, involucre of a single foliaceous bract or absent, rays 2-6, quadrangular, unequal, 5-15 mm long, spreading-ascending, umbellets 2-6-flowered, pedicels unequal, 2-6 mm long (a solitary central flower sometimes present), spreading-ascending to ascending, involucel of 1-5 linear-lanceolate, scaberulous-margined, acute bractlets 1-6 mm long; calyx absent; petals white, elliptic to obovate, without a narrower inflexed apex; styles very short, much shorter than the sharply conical stylopodium.
Fruit
Fruit ovoid, compressed laterally and constricted at the commissure, 3-4 mm long, 2-4 mm wide, apex attenuate, base rounded, mericarps suborbicular in transection, covered with irregularly arranged tubercles, some of which bear slender uncinate bristles, concealing the filiform ribs, vittae large, 1-3 in intervals, 2 on the commissure, commissural face sulcate, mericarps readily separating.
Seeds
Seed grooved beneath the vittae.
Chromosomes
2n = 22*.