Epilobium komarovianum
Common name
creeping willowherb
Synonyms
Epilobium nummularifolium var, brevipes Hook.f.; Epilobium nummularifolium var. minimum Kirk, Epilobium nerteroides var. minimum (Kirk) Cockayne, Epilobium inornatum Melville, Epilobium inornatum var. brevipes (Hook.f.) Melville
Family
Onagraceae
Flora category
Vascular – Native
Endemic taxon
Yes
Endemic genus
No
Endemic family
No
Structural class
Herbs - Dicotyledons other than Composites
NVS code
The National Vegetation Survey (NVS) Databank is a physical archive and electronic databank containing records of over 94,000 vegetation survey plots - including data from over 19,000 permanent plots. NVS maintains a standard set of species code abbreviations that correspond to standard scientific plant names from the Ngä Tipu o Aotearoa - New Zealand Plants database.
EPIKOM
Chromosome number
2n = 36
Current conservation status
The threat classification status of all known New Zealand vascular plant taxa at the rank of species and below were reassessed in 2017 using the New Zealand Threat Classification System (NZTCS) – more information about this can be found on the NZTCS website This report includes a statistical summary and brief notes on changes since 2012 and replaces all previous NZTCS lists for vascular plants. Authors: By Peter J. de Lange, Jeremy R. Rolfe, John W. Barkla, Shannel P. Courtney, Paul D. Champion, Leon R. Perrie, Sarah M. Beadel, Kerry A. Ford, Ilse Breitwieser, Ines Schönberger, Rowan Hindmarsh-Walls, Peter B. Heenan and Kate Ladley. Please note, threat classifications are often suggested by authors when publications fall between NZTCS assessment periods – a suggested threat classification status has not been assessed by the NZTCS panel.
Source: NZTCS and licensed by DOC for reuse under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence.
2017 | Not Threatened
Previous conservation statuses
2012 | Not Threatened
2009 | Not Threatened
2004 | Not Threatened
Distribution
Endemic. New Zealand North, South, Stewart and Chatham islands. Uncommon in the northern half of the North Island.
Also, naturalised in Great Britain, Ireland, Europe and the United States.
Habitat
A species of open, flushes, seepages, and places where water seasonally ponds. Also a component of lake shore and coastal turf, and open riverbeds.
Wetland plant indicator status rating
Information derived from the revised national wetland plant list prepared to assist councils in delineating and monitoring wetlands (Clarkson et al., 2021 Manaaki Whenua – Landcare Research Contract Report LC3975 for Hawke’s Bay Regional Council). The national plant list categorises plants by the extent to which they are found in wetlands and not ‘drylands’. The indicator status ratings are OBL (obligate wetland), FACW (facultative wetland), FAC (facultative), FACU (facultative upland), and UPL (obligate upland).
FACW: Facultative Wetland
Usually is a hydrophyte but occasionally found in uplands (non-wetlands).
Features
Creeping perennial herb forming mats up to 1 m diameter, these tightly appressed to ground. Plants subglabrous or sparsely furnished with round-tipped, appressed, antrorse (occasionaly admixed with appressed retrorse) eglandular hairs in lines decurrent from the margins of the petioles, on the ovaries, capsules, pedicels, sepals, and sometimes on the adaxial and abaxial leaf surfaces of the foliage near the branch terminals. Flowers arising individually from the leaf axils, the stems continuing to grow and root beyond the point where flowers are produced. Leaves opposite, distant to crowded and imbricate, frequently reflexed, dull reddish-green to coppery, adaxially rugose-impressed, bearing 1-4 lateral veins on each side of the midrib; lamina 2.0-12.0 × 1.5-9.0 mm, usually orbicular, but occasionally oblong or ovate (sometimes with all forms on the same plant), apices subacute to obtuse, base attentuate to obtuse, entire or occasionally with 1-3 remote, weak teeth on each side of leaf; subsessile or with petioles up to 3 mm long. Flowers erect. Ovaries green to red-brown, 2.5-12.0 mm long, subglabrous or sparsely hairy, if hairs present these sometimes denser along value edges; pedicels 1-7(-38) mm long, the flowers falling before full pedicel elongation. Floral tube 0.4-1.0 mm deep, 1.0-1.6 mm diameter, subglabrous or sparsely hairy. Sepals not keeled, glabrous or sparsely hairy, 1.5-2.5 × 6.5-1.0 mm. Petals white, 2-4(-5) × 0.9-2.5(-3.0) mm, notch 0.7-1.2 mm deep. Anthers yellow, 0.35-0.8 × 0.25-0.6 mm, filaments of longer stamens 0.3-1.2 mm long, those of shorter 0.2-0.4 mm, generally both shedding pollen directly on the stigma at or before anthesis. Style white 1.1-1.8(-3.0) mm long; stigma white, clavate or capitate, 0.6-1.1 × 0.5-0.8 mm. Capsule subglabrous or sparsely furnished with hairs, 4-30 mm long, borne on a pedicel 3-93(-135) mm long. Seeds brown, 0.5-0.9(-1.1) × 0.25-0.4 mm, obovoid, smooth; coma 3.0-4.5. mm long, readily detaching.
Similar taxa
A distinctive species that differs from E. brunnescens, and all other small Epilobium species except E. angustum, by having rugose-impressed (dimpled) adaxial (upper) leaf surfaces. It is often confused with E. angustum as both species have similar reddish or copper-tinged leaves with adaxially rugose-impressure surfaces. Epilobium angustum is distinguished from E. komarovianum by the glandular pubescent pedicels, ovaries, sepals and capsules (those of E. komarovianum are subglabrate to very sparsely eglandular hairy), and the seeds have a well marked cellular rim absent in E. komarovianum. Epilobium komarovianum has also been much confused with E. nummularifolium, a species with smooth rather than rugose-impressed adaxial leaf surfaces; consistently serrulate rather than entire or weakly and sparingly toothed leaves, and yellow-green, rather then red-green or copper-coloured leaves. The capsules of E. nummularifolium are grey-strigulose rather than subglabrate to sparsely hairy.
Flowering
October to March
Flower colours
White
Fruiting
December to May
Life cycle
Minute pappate seeds are wind dispersed (Thorsen et al., 2009).
Propagation technique
Easily grown from rooted pieces and seed. An attractive species that has proved popular in cultivation overseas. This species can, in suitable situations self-establish and has the potential to be a troublesome weed - as has proved the case in the U.K., Ireland, Europe and the United States of America (Raven & Raven 1976).
Etymology
epilobium: From the Greek epi- ‘upon’ and lobos ‘a pod’, the flowers appearing to be growing on the seed pod.
komarovianum: After Kormarov
Attribution
Fact sheet prepared for NZPCN by P.J. de Lange (30 December 2019). Description adapted from Raven & Raven (1976).
References and further reading
Raven, P.H.; Raven, T.E. 1976: The genus Epilobium in Australasia. New Zealand DSIR Bulletin 216. Wellington, Government Printer.
NZPCN Fact Sheet citation
Please cite as: de Lange, P.J. (Year at time of access): Epilobium komarovianum Fact Sheet (content continuously updated). New Zealand Plant Conservation Network. https://www.nzpcn.org.nz/flora/species/epilobium-komarovianum/ (Date website was queried)