Herb, erect, usually annual, 2-5(-10) dm high; monoecious; main stem 1-2 mm thick or up to 4 mm and becoming spongy when plant grows in water; scale-leaves 0.5-1 mm long, scarious. Deciduous branchlets mostly 2-6 cm long, often reddish-tinged, smooth or scabridulous, with ca 15-30 leaves. Leaves smooth or minutely scabridulous on 1 or both sides; stipules lanceolate, 0.5-1 mm long; blades ovate or suborbicular, ca 3-10(-13) mm long, 2-4(-6) mm broad, obtuse to subtruncate at the tip, not unequal at the base. Cymules unisexual, the proximal axils barren or with cymules of 3-10 staminate flowers, the distal axils with solitary pistillate flowers. Staminate flowers with pedicels 0.4-0.7 mm long; calyx-lobes usually 5, obovate to orbicular, 0.5-0.9 mm long; disc-segments 5(-6), entire or crenulate; stamens 3 (rarely 2), the filaments connate into a column 0.25-0.35 mm high, the anthers dehiscing more or less horizontally; pollen grains 3-colporate. Pistil-late flcwers with pedicels becoming 1.5-2.5 mm long; calyx-lobes 5, obovate, be-coming 1.4-1.8(-2) mm long and 0.8-1.3(-1.5) mm broad, obtuse or rounded; disc 5-angled or lobed, sometimes asymmetric; ovary smooth, the styles free, 0.2-0.3 mm long, bifid, the tips subcapitate. Capsules ca 2.4-2.5 mm in diam, obscurely rugulose; seeds sharply trigonous, 1.1-1.3 mm long, light brown, with ca 10-12 delicate longitudinal striae.
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