Hydrocotyle hirsuta

Hydrocotyle hirsuta Sw.

Common Names: Marsh Pennywort

Family: Apiaceae

Habit: Hydrocotyle hirsuta grows as from an herbaceous rhizome with leaves to 50 cm in height.  The emergent leaves are alternate, pilose/villous pubescent, reniform/cordate with lobes, to 8 cm in diameter, lobes with a crenate margin.

The incomplete, perfect, actinomorphic flowers are arranged in dense, pubescent spikes from leaf axils. There is no calyx. The corolla has 5 unfused white petals. There are 5 unfused stamens.  The inferior ovary has 2 locules each with a single seed.  The fruit is a flattened, brown samara with ridges throughout.

Habitat: Hydrocotyle hirsuta grows in Human Altered environments (waste areas, lawns, seeps, roadsides).

Distribution: Hydrocotyle hirsuta occurs on the northern pine islands in the Lucayan Archipelago as well as the Caribbean region.

Medicinal/Cultural/Economic usage: Hydrocotyle hirsuta is not used medicinally in the Bahamian Archipelago.