Persicaria longiseta (Bruijn) Kitag.

Long Bristle Smartweed; Oriental Lady's Thumb; Asiatic Water Pepper

Herb

Annual

Vascular

Long Bristle Smartweed is an introduced annual in the Buckwheat family (Polygonaceae). It is native to Asia and was introduced into the United States near Philadelphia in 1910. In Alabama in can be found statewide. Long Bristle Smartweed occurs in floodplain forests, on the shores of ponds and lakes, on moist roadsides, in lawns, and in other disturbed moist areas. It is an annual with a taproot. The stems are branched, decumbent, sometimes rooting at the nodes, green or reddish in color, and glabrous. The ocrea has bristles at its summit. Leaves are alternate, sessile or short petiolate, ovate-lanceolate to linear-lanceolate in outline, antrorsely strigose along the margins, and glabrous or sparingly strigose along the main veins. Leaves may have a faint dark blotch near the middle on the upper surface. Flowers are produced in erect, terminal or axillary spike-like arrays. Flowers are in clusters of 1-5 and are subtended by an ocreolae with bristles longer than the flowers. Each flower has 5 pink sepals and no petals. The fruit is a dark brown to black 3-angled achene. The caterpillars of the Gray Hairstreak butterfly (Strymon melinus) feed on the developing fruit of this and other species of Persicaria.—A. Diamond

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Not Native

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