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Published In: Preliminary Catalogue of Anthophyta and Pteridophyta Reported as Growing Spontaneously within One Hundred Miles of New York 4. 1888. (Prelim. Cat.) Name publication detailView in Biodiversity Heritage Library
 

Project Name Data (Last Modified On 8/11/2017)
Acceptance : Accepted
Project Data     (Last Modified On 7/9/2009)
Status: Native

 

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1. Cardamine bulbosa (Schreb. ex Muhl.) Britton, Sterns & Poggenb. (springcress)

C. bulbosa f. fontinalis E.J. Palmer & Steyerm.

C. rhomboidea (Pers.) DC.

Pl. 316 g, h; Map 1331

Plants perennial herbs, occasionally emergent aquatics, with short, tuberous rhizomes, these unsegmented or occasionally irregularly constricted into 2 or 3 segments. Stems (15–)20–60 cm long, glabrous or rarely with sparse, minute hairs to 0.1 mm long (visible only with strong magnification) in the apical half. Leaves 2–7 cm long, simple, entire, wavy-margined, or with few, shallow, widely spaced teeth, glabrous; the basal leaves usually withered by flowering time, long-petiolate, the leaf blades ovate to cordate; the stem leaves 4–14, mostly sessile, ovate to lanceolate or narrowly oblong. Sepals 2.5–5.0 mm long, greenish yellow. Petals (6–)7–12(–16) mm long, white, sometimes faintly pinkish-tinged. Styles 2–3(–5) mm long. Fruits 20–30 mm long, sometimes aborting before maturity. Seeds 1.7–2.1 mm long, irregularly oblong to circular in outline, the surface slightly roughened, orange to greenish yellow. 2n=64, 80, 96. March–June.

Scattered in the southern, central, and northeastern portions of the state (eastern U.S. west to South Dakota and Texas; Canada). Bottomland forests, banks of streams and spring branches, fens, and less commonly seepy bluffs and acid seeps.

There is controversy surrounding the validity of the name C. bulbosa. Some authors have maintained that the basionym Arabis bulbosa Schreb. ex Muhl. was not validly published, and they use the later name C. rhomboidea for this species. The present treatment follows the recommendation of Merrill and Hu (1949), who investigated the names published by Henry Muhlenberg in detail.

Cardamine bulbosa and C. douglassii are both complex, morphologically and cytologically variable species. They are not entirely distinct morphologically in all parts of their ranges, and they have sometimes been treated as varieties of C. bulbosa. Naturally occurring hybrids have been documented from Ohio by Hart and Eshbaugh (1976), who also documented several biochemical and morphological races within each taxon. In Missouri, C. bulbosa flowers on average 2 weeks later than does C. douglassii (Steyermark, 1963), and the characters presented in the key to species above seem to separate the two species adequately.

The rhizomes and aboveground portions of C. bulbosa have a flavor reminiscent of horseradish (Armoracia rusticana) and have been used as a substitute for it in salads and condiments. The species is commonly but not exclusively associated with calcareous substrates.

 


 

 
 
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