Kansas Wildflowers and Grasses

BETONY NOSEBURN

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Tragia betonicifolia Nutt.

Russell County, Kansas

Perennial

Height: 6-22 inches

Family: Euphorbiaceae - Spurge Family

Flowering Period: June, July, August

Stems:

Decumbent to ascending or erect; sap watery.

Leaves:

Cauline, alternate, simple; stipules present; petiole .2 to 1 inch; blade ovate to ovate-lanceolate or triangular-lanceolate, .3 to 2.4 inches long, .28 to 1.2 inch wide, base cordate to truncate, margins serrate, tip acute.

Inflorescences:

Racemes, axillary or terminal, .4 to 2.4 inches; staminate and pistillate flowers on same plant, pistillate flowers proximal and staminate flowers distal; staminate flowers 15-80 per raceme, pistillate flowers 1-2 per raceme; staminate bracts lanceolate, 1/25 to 1/12 inch; pistillate bracts 1/16 to 1/12 inch.

Flowers:

Staminate flowers greenish: pedicel short; sepals 3-4, 1/20 to 1/10 inch; petals 0; stamens 3(-4). Pistillate flowers greenish: sepals 6, connate basally, lanceolate, 1/13 to 1/5 inch, longer than gynoecium (collective term for the pistil(s) of a flower); petals 0; styles 3, connate proximally more than 1/2 their lengths, simple.

Fruits:

Capsules 3-lobed, not enveloped by persistent bracts, 1/6 to 1/5 inch long, 1/4 to 2/5 inch wide; seeds dark brown with light brown streaks, globose to ovoid, 1/8 to 1/6 inch.

Habitat:

Rocky to gravelly or sandy tallgrass and mixed-grass prairies, glades, clearings in oak-hickory woodlands, occasionally rocky old fields.

Distribution:

East 3/5 of Kansas

Origin:

Native

Comments:

The herbage is covered with stiff stinging hairs that are painful when touched, thus the common name nose burn. Tragia, for Hieronymus Bock, a German botanist whose Latinized name was Tragus and betonicifolia, with leaves like those of betony, Stachys.

See also catnip noseburn

Betony noseburn