Appearance
''Comandra'' is a perennial herb growing about 8 to 34 cm tall. The leaves are up to 3.3 cm long and are alternately arranged. The flowers lack petals, but have five greenish-white sepals; the flowers are perfect, containing both male and female structures. The flowers are insect-pollinated. The fruit is a drupe 4-6mm thick. It prefers to grow in drier soils.Subspecies include:
⤷ ''C. u.'' ssp. ''californica'' – California bastard toadflax
⤷ ''C. u.'' ssp. ''pallida'' – pale bastard toadflax, pine bastard toadflax
⤷ ''C. u.'' ssp. ''umbellata''
''C. umbellata'' is hemiparasitic; it is not holoparasitic as it obtains some nutrition through photosynthesis. It has a wide host range, parasitizing over 200 known plant species. These include: ''Acer'', ''Antennaria'', ''Aster'', ''Betula'', ''Carex'', ''Solidago'', ''Fragaria'', ''Populus'', ''oaks'', ''Rosa'', ''Rubus'', ''Vaccinium'' and some grasses.
In Europe the common English name bastard toadflax is used for plants of the genus ''Thesium''.
Uses
A decoction of the plant parts was made by the Navajo people for narcotic and other medicinal usage. In times of food shortage, the berries were used by Native Americans as a food source,...hieroglyph snipped... and though small, they have a sweet taste.References:
Some text fragments are auto parsed from Wikipedia.
