Annual herbs, usually erect, sometimes prostrate, to 60(-100) cm tall, monoecious, glabrous throughout; stem usually slightly woody at base; branchlets angled. Stipules membranous, ovate-triangular, ca. 1 mm, brown; petiole short, nearly absent; leaf blade thinly leathery, linear-lanceolate, oblong, or narrowly elliptic, 5-25 × 2-7 mm, base slightly obliquely rounded, apex obtuse or acute; midrib raised abaxially, flattened adaxially, lateral veins obscure. Plants monoecious. Inflorescences bisexual axillary fascicles usually with 2-4 male and 1 female flower. Male flowers: pedicels ca. 2 mm; sepals 6, broadly ovate or rotund, ca. 0.5 mm; disk glands 6, oblong; stamens 3; filaments free; anthers subglobose. Female flowers: pedicels ca. 5 mm; sepals 6, ovate-oblong, ca. 1 mm, reflexed, purple with whitish membranous margins, persistent in fruit; disk orbicular, undivided; ovary globose, 3-celled, with raised scales, rarely smooth; styles 3, bifid nearly to base, usually recurved. Fruiting pedicels 5-12 mm; capsules oblate, 2-3 mm in diam., purple, with raised scales or smooth. Seeds trigonous, 1.2-1.5 mm, finely warty. Fl. Apr-May, fr. Jun-Nov.
Montane grass-slopes or mixed deciduous forests, savannahs; at elevations from 200-1,400 metres in China. A weed of roadsides, grassy places, arable land and upland rice fields; at elevations up to 750 metres.
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