Flowers: sepal cusps 0.05-0.15 mm; styles straight, 0.1-0.25(-0.3) mm.

Flowering spring-fall. Wood-lands, fields, clearings, rocky areas, roadsides, waste places; 0-1200 m; Ont.,Que.; Ala., Ark., Conn., Del., D.C., Ga., Ill., Ind., Iowa, Kans., Ky., La., Md., Mass., Mich., Minn., Miss., Mo., N.J., N.Y., N.C., Ohio, Okla., Pa., R.I., S.C., Tenn., Tex., Va., W.Va., Wis.

Infrequent northward and probably entirely absent from the northern tier of counties. It is found in dry places in sandy or gravelly soil, usually where the soil is exposed. Fernald has separated [P. fastigiata var. paleacea] from the typical one because of the relative length of the bracts of the flowers. When I interpret this character as applied to my specimens I find intermediates between the two extremes. Neither this character nor others will satisfactorily separate the forms. Usually the typical form when mature is reddish in color and the flowers are much crowded on the ultimate branchlets while plants of the variety [fastigiata] are generally greenish, usually with an erect inflorescence and the flowers are not crowded on the ultimate branchlets. It is to be noted that the variety flowers a month or more earlier than the typical form.

Annual herb with a thread-like to slender taproot 5 - 30 cm tall

Stem: upright, forking, much-branched, minutely hairy (mostly on one side).

Leaves: opposite, 0.5 - 2.5 cm long, 0.5 - 7 mm wide, reverse lance-shaped to elliptic with a blunt to pointed tip, one-veined, often dotted or blotched, sometimes leathery, sometimes having hair-like growths along the midrib, with conspicuous stipules. Stipules two per node, 0.5 - 4.5 mm long, awl-shaped to lance-shaped with a long-pointed tip, papery.

Inflorescence: a terminal, forked, loose to compact cluster (cyme) of 25 to 70 flowers, 3 - 10 mm wide.

Flowers: without petals, tiny, hypanthium (a floral tube formed by the sepals and stamens) cup-shaped, sometimes with a few scattered hairs, subtended by stipular bracts that are equal to or longer than the calyx (the sepals, collectively). Stamens usually five. Styles two, short.

Sepals: five, ascending or slightly descending, fused at the base, greenish to brownish with white or translucent margins, lance-shaped to linear with a point at the tip, without veins, leathery to rigid, scarious-margined (dry, thin, and membranous), with a prominent, narrowly rounded hood at the end. Calyx (the sepals, collectively) 2 - 3 mm long.

Fruit: bladder-like, one-seeded (utricle), indehiscent, about 1 mm long, reverse egg-shaped to reverse conical, membranous, on an upright stalk. Seed brown, laterally compressed.

Similar species: The similar Paronychia canadensis differs by having hairless stems and shorter calyxes (1 - 1.5 mm).

Flowering: June to October

Habitat and ecology: Woods, grassland, and in the shade of picnic areas.

Occurence in the Chicago region: native

Etymology: Paronychia comes from the Greek words para, meaning near, and onyx, meaning nail, referring to the flame colored flowers. Fastigiata means "having close together, erect branches, which often form a column."

Author: The Morton Arboretum