Kansas Wildflowers and Grasses - Cut-leaf ground-cherry

CUT-LEAF GROUND-CHERRY

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Physalis angulata L.

Riley County, Kansas

Annual

Height: 6-32 inches

Family: Solanaceae - Nightshade Family

Flowering Period: June, July, August, September,October

Stems:

Erect, branched from base, glabrous or elaborate. Plants glabrous or sparsely appressed-pubescent.

Leaves:

Variable, cauline, alternate, occasionally subopposite or fascicled, simple; stipules absent; petiole 2/5 to 3 inches; blade ovate to lanceolate-ovate or elliptic, 1 to 4 inches long, 2/5 to 2 inches wide, base acute or acuminate, margins usually coarsely and irregularly toothed, less frequently sinuate or entire, tip acute or acuminate.

Inflorescences:

1-flowered, axillary.

Flowers:

Pedicels .2 to 1.6 inch in flower, .8 to 1.6 inch in fruit. Flowers nodding at anthesis; calyx campanulate, 5-lobed, 1/8 to 1/5 inch, antrorsely appressed-puberulent; corolla pale yellow, center not dark-spotted, campanulate to nearly rotate, 5-angled to entire, 1/6 to 1/5 inch; stamens 5, included; anthers bluish or violet, 1/25 to 1/10 inch.

Fruits:

Fruiting calyx bladdery-inflated, loose-fitting around berry, .8 to 1.4 inch, 10-angled; berry globose, 2/5 to 1/5 inch diam.; seeds numerous, reniform to ovate, somewhat flattened, minutely pitted.

Habitat:

Alluvial soils along stream and lake margins, moist open woods, fields, roadside ditches, and disturbed areas

Distribution:

East 1/2 of Kansas

Origin:

Native

Comments:

Physalis, bladder, alluding to the inflated calyx. Kansas plants belong to var. pendula (Rydb.) Waterf.

Cut-leaf ground-cherry flower