Tetragonia decumbens
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Dune spinach | |
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Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| Clade: | Tracheophytes |
| Clade: | Angiosperms |
| Clade: | Eudicots |
| Order: | Caryophyllales |
| Family: | Aizoaceae |
| Genus: | Tetragonia |
| Species: | T. decumbens |
| Binomial name | |
| Tetragonia decumbens | |
Tetragonia decumbens (dune spinach or sea spinach) is a coastal shrub, native to southern Africa.[1]
It grows as a trailing undershrub with thick, pale, furry stems, and thick, oval, saddle-shaped leaves 10-60 millimetres long and 5-30 millimetres wide. Flowers occur in clusters of three to five, and comprise four light yellow perianth segments surrounding a centre of many stamens.[2] The fruit is succulent with four wings, whence the genus name 'Tetragonia' = four-angled.
Taxonomy
It was first described and named by Philip Miller in 1768.[3] In 1862 the name T. zeyheri was published by Eduard Fenzl, but this has since been determined to be a synonym of T. decumbens.[4]
