Houstonia pusilla Schöpf

Tiny Bluet; Small Bluet; Star Violet

Herb

Annual

Vascular

Tiny Bluet is a native herbaceous annual in the Madder family (Rubiaceae). It can be found throughout Alabama. Tiny Bluet grows in lawns, in pastures, in cemeteries, in sandhills, and on rock outcrops. It is an annual with a taproot. Plants often produce several branched stems from 1-3 inches in height. The stems are green, winged, and often tinted purple-red at the base. Leaves are opposite, petiolate, ovate to lanceolate in outline, glabrous, and have toothed margins. Flowers are produced singly on long axillary peduncles. The corolla consists of a short tube with four spreading lobes. Flowers are blue or rarely white in color. The center of the flower is reddish-purple. The fruit is a capsule. Southern Bluet (Houstonia micrantha (Shinners) Terrell) is similar. It has smaller white flowers with a yellow center.—A. Diamond

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Native FAC- (NWPL)

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