Variable Leaf Yellowcress

Sometimes nodal thread-like roots are present below in addition to its main root. There is some overlapping of characters between this and the previous species, except for its annual or biennial habit. However, there are forms which can be placed in both the species.

Although the type of Cardamine lamontii was collected from Hong Kong (Sep 1874, J. Lamont s.n. (holotype, BM)), that name was not listed in FRPS or any other provincial Chinese flora.

This species is used medicinally.

Annual or biennial herb, 50-60 (-75) cm tall, sparsely hairy to glabrous (in our area), often much branched above. Leaves similar to the above species but sinuate and toothed, pinnatifid, lyrate to almost entire; upper ones often acute or acuminate with an elongated apex. Racemes elongated, 25-35-flowered, up to 15 cm long in fruit. Flowers c. 2.5 mm across, yellow; pedicels up to 5 mm long in fruit, ascending or subspreading. Sepals 2-2.5 mm long. Petals usually about as long as the sepals, sometimes reduced or suppressed. Stamens c. 1.5:2 mm long. Siliquae usually 10-15 mm long, c. 1.5 mm broad, slender but often slightly up-curved, blunt apexed with c. 1 mm long style and capitate stigma; seeds subbiseriate (or biseriate), minute, c. 0.5 mm long, usually about 100 (or more) in each fruit.

Herbs annual, (6-)20-60(-75) cm tall, glabrous or rarely sparsely pubescent. Stems often branched basally and apically. Basal leaves withered by flowering. Lower and middle cauline leaves auriculate or not; petiole absent or 1-4 cm; leaf blade lyrate-pinnatipartite or undivided, obovate, oblong, or lanceolate, (2.5-)3.5-12(-16) × (0.8-)1.5-4(-5) cm, margin entire, irregularly crenate, or serrate, apex obtuse or subacute; terminal lobe oblong, elliptic, or oblong-lanceolate, to 10 × 5 cm; lateral lobes absent or 1-5(or 6) on each side of midvein. Uppermost leaves usually sessile, auriculate or not; leaf blade lanceolate or oblong, margin entire, denticulate, or serrulate, apex acute or acuminate. Racemes ebracteate. Fruiting pedicels slender, ascending, divaricate, or rarely slightly reflexed, straight, (2-)3-10(-15) mm. Sepals often green or pinkish, ascending, oblong-ovate, 2-3 × 0.8-1.5 mm, margin membranous. Petals yellow, obovate or spatulate, (2.5-)3-4(-4.5) × 1-1.5 mm, rarely absent. Filaments 1.5-3 mm; anthers oblong, 0.5-0.8 mm. Ovules (60-)70-110 per ovary. Fruit linear, (0.7-)1-2.4(-3) cm × 1-1.5(-2) mm, often curved upward; valves thin papery, not veined; style (0.5-)1-1.5(-2) mm, slender, narrower than fruit. Seeds reddish brown, ovate or ovate-orbicular, 0.5-0.9 × 0.4-0.6 mm, foveolate, biseriate or nearly so. Fl. and fr. throughout the year. 2n = 24*, 32*, 48*.

Himalaya, India, east to China and Japan, Malaysia.

Distribution: Pakistan, Himalaya, India, Indonesia and Africa.

Anhui, Fujian, Gansu, Guangdong, Guangxi, Guizhou, Hainan, Hebei, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Liaoning, Qinghai, Shaanxi, Shandong, Shanxi, Sichuan, Taiwan, Xizang, Yunnan, Zhejiang [Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Sikkim, Thailand, Vietnam; naturalized in North and South America].

100-200 m

Fl. Per.: April-June.

Roadsides, field margins, gardens, river banks; near sea level to 3200 m.

Sisymbrium indicum Linnaeus, Sp. Pl., ed. 2, 2: 917. 1763; Cardamine glandulosa Blanco; C. lamontii Hance; Nasturtium atrovirens (Hornemann) de Candolle; N. diffusum de Candolle; N. indicum (Linnaeus) de Candolle (1821), not Garsault (1764); N. montanum Wallich ex J. D. Hooker & Thomson; N. sinapis (N. L. Burman) O. E. Schulz; Radicula montana (Wallich ex J. D. Hooker & Thomson) Hu ex C. Pei; Rorippa atrovirens (Hornemann) Ohwi & H. Hara; R. montana (Wallich ex J. D. Hooker & Thomson) Small; R. sinapis (N. L. Burman) Ohwi & H. Hara; S. atrovirens Hornemann; S. sinapis N. L. Burman.