Brunnichia ovata (Walter) Shinners

American Buckwheat Vine; Ladies' Eardrops; Redvine

Vine

Perennial

Vascular

Ladies' Eardrops is a native deciduous woody perennial vine in the Buckwheat family (Polygonaceae). It can be found throughout Alabama. Ladies' Eardrops occurs on riverbanks, around the margins of lakes and ponds, and in low wet woods. It is a perennial woody vine climbing by tendrils. The tendrils are branched. Vines are 20-60 feet in length, often climbing high in trees. Young stems are green and grooved. Older stems have reddish or gray bark with numerous lenticels. The deciduous leaves are alternate, petiolate, ovate to ovate-lanceolate in outline, with entire margins. The leaves are glabrous with truncate to cordate bases. The ocrea (formed by the stipules fused into a sheath around the stem) is tiny and fringed by reddish-brown hairs. Fragrant flowers are produced in large terminal and axillary panicles. Each flower is campanulate in shape with 5 yellowish-green tepals. The fruit is a large 3-angled achene. The achene resembles an ear pendant, thus the common name.--A. Diamond

**

Native FACW (NWPL)

**