Common Name

Spreading Cress

Family

Brassicaceae

Notes

Annual forb, prostrate to sprawling, stems to 20cm long.  Leaves in a basal rosette and alternating along the stems, to 4cm long, flat, hairy.  Basal leaves with margins entire, lobed, or dissected.  Stem leaves toothed.  Flowers with 4 white or cream petals, in racemes at the ends of the stems which lengthen as the fruiting bodies mature.  Rare SA.  Vulnerable Vic.

Differs from Phlegmatospermum cochlearinum in that the plant is prostrate to spreading.

Description in G.M. Cunningham, WE Mulham, PL Milthorpe and J H Leigh (1981 and later printings) Plants of Western New South Wales page 330

eFlora of South Australia fact sheet with line drawings:   http://www.flora.sa.gov.au/cgi-bin/speciesfacts_display.cgi?form=speciesfacts&name=Phlegmatospermum_eremaeum

Photo of dried plant. © copyright of the Board of Trustees of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Plants from Hughes, Nullarbor Plain, SA, collected by EH Ising, 1920