Flowers and fruiting bodies. Australian Plant Image Index, photo: RG & FJ Richardson, the Coorong, SA

Plant. Australian Plant Image Index, photo: RG & FJ Richardson, the Coorong, SA

Common Name

False Caper, Terracina Spurge

Family

Euphorbiaceae

Notes

Introduced perennial forb to 1m tall producing numerous stems annually from a long-lived crown. Leaves alternating along the stems below, opposite each other on flowering branches, 1-5.5cm long, 2-30mm wide, narrow and flat, hairless, edges entire to toothed, with a pointed tip, sometimes with a notched tip. Male and female flowers on the same plant. Flowers green with greenish yellow glands, with 0 petals, in small bell-shaped heads that look like a single flower, each head composed of 3-4 bundles of male flowers surrounding 1 female flower, 1-2 flower heads at the bases of the leaves, or 2-3 flower heads at the tops of the stems, in an umbel of 5-6 repeatedly forked branchlets, each fork subtended by a pair of leaves, the whole umbel at the top of the stem. Declared plant in SA.

Description and photo in G.M. Cunningham, WE Mulham, PL Milthorpe and J H Leigh (1981 and later printings) Plants of Western New South Wales pages 458-459

eFlora of South Australia description: http://www.flora.sa.gov.au/cgi-bin/speciesfacts_display.cgi?form=speciesfacts&name=Euphorbia_terracina

Weeds of Australia Biosecurity Queensland description: http://keyserver.lucidcentral.org/weeds/data/03030800-0b07-490a-8d04-0605030c0f01/media/Html/Euphorbia_terracina.htm