Agalinis fasciculata (Elliott) Raf.
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Authority
Britton, Nathaniel L. Flora Borinqueña.
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Family
Scrophulariaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Species Description - Finding this charming plant in bloom is a red-letter day, for it is one of the most delicately beautiful native herbs of Porto Rico, growing on grassy banks and in fields in wet or moist districts, at lower and middle elevations, but is now by no means common, unless locally; it is widely distributed in the south-eastern United States, grows also in Santo Domingo, and has been recorded from Cuba. Doctor Pennell, in his account of the plant in "Addisonia" remarks that it often springs up in fields abandoned from cultivation, and characterizes its flowers as "superbly modeled and colored." The genus Agalinis (name Greek, meaning beautiful flax), consists of 50 or more species, most of them in the eastern United States, a few only in tropical America; they are slender, upright, branching herbs, with narrow, opposite leaves, and showy flowers, loosley clustered; the bell-shaped calyx is 5-toothed or 5-lobed, the corolla-limb 5-lobed, with the anterior lobes exterior in the bud; the 4 stamens in 2 pairs of 2, are shorter than the corolla, with hairy filaments; the stlye is very slender. The fruit is a round capsule, which splits at maturity, containing many, very small seeds. Some botanists have used the generic name Gerardia for these plants, but bibliographic study has shown that this name, published by Linnaeus, belongs to low plants of the Acanthus Family, two species inhabiting Porto Rico. Agalinis fasciculata is annual in duration, from about 0.6 meter to 1.3 meter high, its stem and branches usually rough. Its longer leaves are 1.5 centimeter to about 3 centimeters long and from 1 to 1.5 millimeters wide; many of them subtend clusters (fascicles) of smaller leaves along the stem, whence the specific fasciculata. The flowers are borne on short stalks; the calyx is 3 or 4 millimeters long, with short, pointed lobes; the pink or purplish corolla is from 2 to nearly 3 centimeters long and about as broad as long often with small re-purple spots and 2 yellow bands on the tube within. The dry, nearly globular capsule is about 5 millimeters in diameter. A related, North American species, Agalinis purpurea, has been doubtfully recorded as inhabiting Porto Rico; this has smooth stems, and is without fascicles of small leaves.
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Discussion
Rough-stemmed Agalinis Herba Veronica Figwort Family Gerardia fasciculata Elliott, Botany of South Carolina and Georgia 2: 115. 1824. Gerardia domingensis Sprengel, Systema Vegetabilium 2: 63. 1825. Agalinis fasciculata Rafinesque, New Flora of North America 2: 65. 1837