Polygonum aviculare

Te Awa Kairangi / Hutt River.<br>Photographer: Jeremy R. Rolfe, Date taken: 06/05/2006, Licence: <a target='_blank' href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0'>CC BY</a>. <a class='member-message' href='/nzpcn/why-join-nzpcn/' target='_blank'>Members can view a larger version of this image.</a>

Polygonum aviculare.<br>Photographer: John Smith-Dodsworth, Licence: <a target='_blank' href='https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0'>CC BY-NC</a>. <a class='member-message' href='/nzpcn/why-join-nzpcn/' target='_blank'>Members can view a larger version of this image.</a>

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Common name

wireweed

Family

Polygonaceae

Authority

Polygonum aviculare L.

Flora category

Vascular – Exotic

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.

POLAVI

Brief description

Stems bluish-green, leafy, wiry, extending 10 to 60 cm in all directions from the small taproot and forming adense mat. each joint or node covered with a thin papery sheath. Leaves bluish-green, alternate, oblong, narrowed at the base, pointed at tip. Flowers very small, yellow or white, borne in clusters in the leaf axils (Wax, Fawcett and Isely 1981).

Similar taxa

Polygonum arenastrum

Flower colours

White, Yellow

Year naturalised

1853

Origin

Europe

Etymology

aviculare: Small bird

Reproduction
Seed.

Seed
Seeds small, slender, reddish-brown, triangular (Wax, Fawcett and Isely 1981).

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