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Annual herb with diffuse or mat-forming habit; roots slender, reddish. Stems prostrate or decumbent; angles scabrid. Lvs and leaflike stipules (1.5)-2-15 × (0.8)-1-4 mm, narrow-to broad-elliptic, hairy; margins and midrib beneath scabrid; apex mucronate or acuminate. Involucral bracts similar to lvs but sometimes almost lanceolate. Calyx lobes c. 0.5 mm long, lanceolate-ovate. Corolla 2-4.5 mm diam.; tube slender, > lobes, whitish; limb cross-shaped; lobes c. 2 mm long, narrow-elliptic, usually mauve, occasionally white. Mericarps 1.5-2 mm long excluding persistent calyx, obovoid or ellipsoid, with appressed hairs.
Diffusely branched annual to 4 dm, the square stems procumbent at base, ± rough-hairy; lvs mostly in whorls of 6, linear to narrowly elliptic, 0.5–2 cm, sharp-pointed, hairy; involucral lvs usually 8, lance-linear; sep triangular; cor pink or blue, 4–5 mm; fr obovoid, scabrous, 2–7 mm; 2n=22. Waste places, or a weed in cultivated ground; native of w. Eurasia and n. Afr., now found here and there in our range.
Fls 4(–6)-merous; sep erect; cor funnelform with slender tube; stamens about equaling the cor-lobes; ovary bilocular, with a single axile ovule in each locule; style unequally bifid; fr dry, longitudinally 2-ribbed, crowned by the persistent sep; herbs with whorled lvs and small fls in terminal heads, surrounded by an involucre of lanceolate, basally connate lvs. Monospecific.
