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Manual of the New Zealand Flora.
2. Rumex, Linn
2. Rumex, Linn.
Perennial or annual herbs, very rarely shrubby. Leaves all radical or radical and cauline, often cordate or hastate at the base, entire or toothed or almost pinnatifid. flowers hermaphrodite or less commonly unisexual, small, green, in axillary clusters or whorls, often forming simple or panicled racemes. Perianth-segments 6, the 3 inner enlarging and closing over the fruit, margins entire or toothed, midrib often tubercled. Stamens 6. Ovary 3-gonous; styles short, filiform; stigmas fimbriate. Nut 3-gonous, included in the enlarged inner perianth-segments, angles acute. Embryo lateral.
A large genus of over 100 species, found in all temperate and many tropical countries, and including several common weeds of cultivation. Both the New Zealand species.are endemic.
| Flowering - stems much divaricately branched, 6–18 in. high. Inner perianth-segments without tubercles, reticulate, margins usually with long curved spines | 1. R.flexuosus. |
| Flowering - stems short, stout, depressed, 2–6 in. high. Inner perianth-segments tubercled; margins entire or with 1 or 2 short teeth | 2. R. neglectus. |
Several species of Rumex from the Northern Hemisphere have been introduced into the colony, and are now widely diffused, the most abundant being the English "docks" R. obtusifolius, R. crispus, and R. viridis; and the "sheeps" sorrel" R. acetosella. Descriptions of these will be found in any English Flora.
| 1. |
R. flexuosus, Sol. ex Forst. Prodr, n. 515. — A glabrous perennial herb with a diffusely branched stem 6–18 in. high; branches slender, grooved, flexuous, divaricate. Leaves chiefly page 591radical, variable in size, 3–12 in. long, linear or linear-oblong, acute or obtuse, cuneate or truncate or cordate at the base, rarely-expanded or subhastate; margins flat or waved. Panicle at first open, but in an advanced fruiting stage the branches are often numerous, spreading and intricate; whorls remote, 4–12-flowered, the lower ones leafy; peduncles jointed near the base, curved, deflexed. Inner segments of the fruiting - perianth about 1/10 in. long, rhomboid, narrowed into a long acuminate tip, reticulated, without tubercles; margins entire or more usually furnished with 1–4 hooked spines on each side.—Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 211; Handb. N.Z. Fl. 237. A. Cunninghamii, Meissn. in D.C. Prodr. xiv. 62. E. Brownianus, A. Cunn. Precur. n. 360 (not of Camp.); Raoul, Choix, 42. Kermadec Islands, North and South Islands: Abundant throughout. Sea-level to 4000 ft. December–March. Very closely allied to the Australian R. Brownii, to which it was referred by Allan Cunningham, and from which it differs mainly in the more diffusely branched habit. |
| 2. |
R. neglectus, T. Kirk in Trans. N.Z. Inst. ix. (1877) 493. —A glabrous perennial herb 2–6 in. high; rootstock long, stout, often branched above. Leaves rosulate, 1–3 in. long, linear-oblong, obtuse, truncate or cuneate at the base, margins crenate-undulate; petiole almost as long as the blade. Flowering-stem short, stout, depressed, simple or with 1–2 branches from the base; dense-flowered or rarely elongated with the whorls interrupted; peduncles usually deflexed. Flowers hermaphrodite. Fruiting-perianth sub-campanulate, about ⅛ in. long, thickened at the base; outer segments oblong, obtuse, equalling the tube; inner rather longer, lanceolate, acute, with a tubercle on the midrib and 1 or 2 short teeth on each side.—Oliver in Hook. Ic. Plant, t. 1245. R. cunei-folius var. alismæfolius, Hook. f. Fl. Antarct. i. 67. North Island: Pebbly beaches near Wellington, Kirk! South Island: Canterbury — Armstrong. Otago — Dusky Bay, Buchanan! Port Molyneux, Catlin River, the Bluff, Petrie! Stewart Island: Paterson's Inlet, Petrie! Auckland Islands: Sir J. D. Hooker, Kirk! November–March. |