Lythrum lineare L.

Saltmarsh Loosestrife; Narrowleaf Loosestrife

Herb

Perennial

Vascular

Loosestrife is a native herbaceous perennial in the Loosestrife family (Lythraceae). It is native to coastal Alabama. Saltmarsh Loosestrife occurs in brackish to saline marshes. It is a perennial with a short rhizome. Stems are erect, branched above the middle, rounded below and 4-angled on flowering branches, glabrous, and green above and reddish brown below. Leaves are opposite throughout. The leaves are sessile, linear-oblong in outline, glabrous, with entire margins. The leaves are greatly reduced upwards. Late in the season prostrate stolons are produced from the base of the plant that root at the nodes and have spatulate leaves. Flowers are solitary in the axils of the upper bract-like leaves. Each flower has a turbinate ribbed calyx with 5 triangular teeth and intersepalar appendages alternating with them. The intersepalar appendages are narrower and longer than the calyx teeth. The corolla is funnel-form with 6 petals fused at the base into a short tube. The petals range in color from pale lavender to white. The styles are of different lengths in different flowers (heterostylic). The fruit is a capsule.—A. Diamond

**

Native OBL (NWPL)

**