Short taproot; stems simple or branched, erect, ascending; herbage glandular and hairy, leaves and bracts often smooth; plant can be without hairs; whitish or pink small flowers in terminal and a few axillary elongated clusters.
Stems erect or ascending; leaves 3 to 10 times as long as wide, margins smooth or toothed toward tips; flowers white or pale pink, short- stemmed in elongated terminal clusters, sometimes also in 1 to 4 axillary clusters or may appear as solitary.
Habitat
Usually along streams and washes, cultivated fields.
Flower Characteristics
Bracts below small whitish to pink flowers leaf-like; flowers short-stemmed in terminal or a few axillary elongated clusters of 5 to 40 flowers; flowers mostly solitary in leaf axils.
Leaf and Stem Characteristics
Leaf blades narrowly oblong, wider at base; 3 to 10 times as long as wide, base wedge-shaped, margins smooth or toothed towards tip, tip pointed, surfaces smooth to densely glandular-hairy.
Fruit and Seed Characteristics
Capsules strongly compressed in cross section, broadly notched at the tip, broader at attachment end.
Seeds number 2 to 140, yellow or pale brown, oblong, flat.