Commelina maculata Edgew.

Commelina maculata is very similar to C. paludosa from which it differs in having stems creeping proximally, numerous branched, slender, rooting at nodes; leaves smaller, 4--10 × 1.5--2.5 cm; and involucral bracts fewer and smaller, often only 2 or 3 forming heads.

Herbs perennial. Stems procumbent or creeping, branched, elongate, glabrous or sparsely hispidulous throughout or in a line. Leaf sheaths brown, white, or yellow ciliate at mouth, glabrous elsewhere or hairy in a line on 1 side; leaf blade ovate-lanceolate or lanceolate, 4--10 × 1.5--2.5 cm, villous on both surfaces. Involucral bracts 2 or 3(or 4), forming heads at apex of branches, sessile or with stalks less than 5 mm, funnelform, 1.5--2 cm, glabrous or sparsely multicellular hispid, proximal margins connate, apex shortly acute. Cincinni with 3 or 4(or several) flowers slightly exserted only at anthesis and included in fruit; pedicels ca. 3 mm. Sepals ca. 4 mm, membranous. Petals blue, 2 anterior ones to 10 mm, posterior one ca. 4 mm. Capsule globose, trigonous, ca. 4 mm, 3-valved, or 2-valved by abortion of 1 ovule. Seeds 1 per valve, gray-black, ellipsoid, ca. 3 mm, slightly flattened, subsmooth. Fl. Jun--Aug.

Himalaya, India, Ceylon, Burma, China, Taiwan, Malaysia.

SW Guizhou, SW Sichuan, S Xizang, Yunnan [Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Sikkim].

1600 m

Humid forest margins, grasslands, roadsides, ditches; near sea level to 2900 m.

Commelina obliqua Buchanan-Hamilton ex D. Don var. viscida C. B. Clarke; C. paludosa Blume var. viscida (C. B. Clarke) R. S. Rao & Kammathy.