Country Mallow

In Pakistan it is common in Sind particularly in Tharparker district.

Erect, velvety undershrub, 20-120 cm tall. Branches, petiole and pedicel stellate pubescent mixed with simple, spreading hairs. Leaves stipulate, stipule 2-6 mm long, filiform, stellate hairy; petiole 0.5-3 cm long, stellate tomentose; blade 1-4.5 cm long, 0.7-3.5 cm broad, usually ovate, some what orbicular, or lanceolate, rounded or slightly cordate at base, acute at apex, crenate to serrate, on bath surface stellate pubescent, also mixed with simple hairs on the nerves beneath, velvety. Flowers axillary, solitary or paired or more in terminal branches; pedicel 4-7 mm, in fruit up to 2 cm long, jointed near the top. Calyx 5-10 mm long, 5-8 mm across, densely stellate tomentose outside and mixed with simple, spreading hairs, fused to the middle; lobes triangular or deltoid, acute to acuminate. Petals yellow, slightly exceeding the calyx, obliquely obovate. Staminal column c. 3 mm long, hairy or glabrous. Fruit discoid, 5-8 mm across, stellate pubescent in the upper half, dehiscent; mericarps 9-10, reticulate, radially 3-3.5 mm long, c. 2.5 mm broad, dorsally 2-2.6 mm broad, slightly grooved; awns 2, divergent. 3-5 mm long, retrorsely hairy. Seeds brown to dark brown, flattened, c. 2 mm long and broad, glabrous except hilum.

Subshrubs erect, ca. 1 m tall. Branchlets, stipules, petioles, and leaves densely stellate strigose; branchlets and petioles velutinous, hairs ca. 3 mm. Stipule filiform, ca. 5 mm; petiole 1-2.5 cm; leaf blade ovate, 1.5-5 × 1-4 cm, abaxially velutinous on veins, base minutely cordate or rounded, margin crenate, apex obtuse to rounded. Flower solitary or fascicled, axillary or terminal. Pedicel 5-15 mm, densely stellate pilose and with long hairs, articulate in distal part. Calyx cup-shaped, lobes triangular, 5-6 mm, densely stellate pilose and with long hairs. Corolla yellow, ca. 1.5 cm in diam.; petals oblong, 6-8 mm. Filament tube ca. 6 mm, hirsute. Schizocarp 6-8 mm in diam.; mericarps 10, with vertical grooves, apex 2-awned, awn 3-4 mm, exceeding calyx, retrorsely barbed. Seeds long ovoid, apex hairy. Fl. year-round.

A pantropical weed.

Distribution: Common in tropical and subtropical countries.

500-1100 m

Scrub on slopes, grassy roadsides. Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, Sichuan, Taiwan, Yunnan [Bhutan, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand; Africa, South America; ± pantropical].

Sida herbacea Cavanilles; S. holosericea Willdenow ex Sprengel; S. hongkongensis Gandoger; S. rotundifolia Lamarck ex Cavanilles.