Fagopyrum esculentum Moench

Garden Buckwheat

Herb

Annual

Vascular

Garden Buckwheat is an introduced herbaceous annual in the Buckwheat family (Polygonaceae). It is native to southwestern China. Garden Buckwheat is widely cultivated and has been collected as an escape or waif at scattered locations in Alabama. It is an erect herbaceous annual to 2 feet in height. The stems are branched and green or green striped with red in color. Leaves are alternate, petiolate, hastate, sagittate, triangular, or cordate in outline with ciliolate margins. The ocrea is brownish in color, glabrous, and lacks cilia on the margin. Flowers are produced in terminal or axillary panicle-like inflorescences. Individual flowers are bisexual with 5 white to pinkish tepals, 8 stamens, and 3 styles. The outer tepals are smaller than the inner. The fruit is a 3-angled glabrous dark brown achene. Garden Buckwheat is commonly cultivated for its edible seed, as a wildlife food plot plant, as a cover crop, and for erosion control. The common name “Buckwheat” is thought to be a corruption of the Dutch name “Beech Wheat”. This is derived from the resemblance of the fruit to those of the Beech tree and that they are edible and used in a similar fashion as wheat. Garden Buckwheat is an excellent pollen and nectar source for insects.—A. Diamond.

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Not Native

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