Fallopia convolvulus (Wild Buckwheat) - photos and description
Ocrea not fringed with hairs.
General: An annual, twining species with weak stems. Plants glabrous. This plant has been designated as a noxious weed in Saskatchewan.
Flowers: Tiny greenish flowers grow in terminal and axillary spikes. The flowers in our experience only open into a narrow tube, and only 1 or rarely 2 flowers per spike open at a time. The flowers consist of greenish-white petal-like sepals. We measured a flower at 1.5 mm diameter, and 2 mm long.
Leaves: Leaves are alternate, arrow-shaped with a chordate base and with long petioles. The leaves reduce in size towards the stem tips. We measured a leaf at 70 mm long by 38 mm wide. There is a sheathing ocrea where the leaf joins the stem, the ocreae are translucent and hairless.
Height: Stem length listed in Flora of Alberta to 80 cm long, we measured plants with stems to 148 cm long.
Habitat: Cultivated and waste ground.
Abundance: Common.
Origin: Introduced.
Synonym: Listed in some of the field guides we use as Polygonum convolvulus.
When and where photographed: Photos taken August 8th and 13th, bare soil in shrub bed along walking path, in our home city of Regina, SK.