Common name: Hen and Chicken
Phyllanthus tenellus Roxb. APNI*
Description: Erect, many-branched annual or perennial, broad-leaved, glabrous herbs, usually up to 0.5 m high, but occasionally to 2 m high in favourable conditions.
Leaves elliptic to obovate, 6–25 mm long, 2–10 mm wide, margins flat, ± wavy, lower surface paler.
Flowers solitary or 2 or 3 males and 1 or 2 females together, peduncle to 5 mm long. Perianth segments narrow-ovate, c. 1 mm long, margins broad, white, not enlarging under fruit. Stamens 5, filaments free.
Capsule 1.5–2 mm diam., greenish; seeds c. 1 mm long, orange-brown, dorsally minutely tuberculate in longitudinal rows.
Flowering: mainly summer.
Distribution and occurrence: Native of Madag., now naturalized in trop. & subtrop. regions.
NSW subdivisions: *NC, *CC, *CT, *CWS, *SC, *LHI
Other Australian states: *Qld
Text by T. A. James & G. J. Harden Taxon concept: Flora of NSW 1 (1990)
APNI* Provides a link to the Australian Plant Name Index (hosted by the Australian National Botanic Gardens) for comprehensive bibliographic data ***The AVH map option provides a detailed interactive Australia wide distribution map drawn from collections held by all major Australian herbaria participating in the Australian Virtual Herbarium project.
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