Biorepository Data Portal

Plants (3-)5-30(-38) cm, herbage glabrous. Leaves: petiole 0.5-4 cm; rachis 2.5-5 mm; leaflets 3-7, 7-12 × 1-3.5 mm, apex obtuse or acute. Pedicels 0.5-2 cm (± equal to subtending petiole at anthesis, elongating 1.5 times by fruit maturity). Flowers: sepals green, 5-nerved, 2-6 mm; petals white, greenish white, or pale pink, oblanceolate to narrowly elliptic, 1.4-2 mm; filaments filiform, 1-1.5 mm; anthers yellowish, broadly ellipsoid, 0.2-0.3 mm. Mericarps green to brown, somewhat fleshy, 2-3.5 × 2-3 mm (often only 1 seed maturing per flower). 2n = 10. Flowering spring-early summer. Floodplain forests, swamps, wet-mesic coniferous or broadleaf woods, alpine meadows, pastures, moist areas in sagebrush or desert washes; 50-2600(-3200) m; B.C., N.S., Ont., Que.; Calif., Colo., Conn., Del., D.C., Idaho, Ill., Ind., Iowa, Ky., La., Md., Mass., Mich., Minn., Mo., Mont., Nev., N.J., N.Y., N.Dak., Ohio, Oreg., Pa., Tenn., Utah, Vt., Va., Wash., W.Va., Wis., Wyo. The stems of Floerkea proserpinacoides have a spicy flavor and are eaten in salads. A flower of F. proserpinacoides is the logo for the Flora of North America project.

Annual herb 5 - 30 cm tall Stem: weak, decumbent to somewhat upright, hairless. Leaves: alternate, compound or deeply divided into three to seven segments 0.5 - 2 cm long, each segment linear to elliptic or inversely egg-shaped. Flowers: white, with three lance-egg-shaped sepals 2.5 - 6 mm long and three 1 - 2 mm long petals that are inversely egg-shaped. Fruit: separating into tiny, egg-shaped to spherical, warty segments (mericarps).

Similar species: No information at this time.

Flowering: late April to late May

Habitat and ecology: Common in sugar maple woods, often near springy creeks.

Occurence in the Chicago region: native

Etymology: Floerkea is named after the German botanist Heinrich Gustav Floerke (1764-1835). Proserpinacoides means "like Proserpinaca."

Author: The Morton Arboretum

Glabrous, weak, decumbent to suberect, 0.5-3 dm; lvs compound or deeply divided into 3-7 linear, oblanceolate or elliptic segments 0.5-2 cm; pedicels axillary, at first about equaling the petiole, much longer in fr; sep lance-ovate, 2.5-3 mm at anthesis, to 6 mm at maturity; pet oblanceolate, 1-2 mm; mericarps 2.5 mm, ovoid-globose, warty. Damp woods in rich soil; N.S. and w. Que. to B.C., s. to Del., Tenn., and Calif. Apr., May.

Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

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