Paronychia franciscana

Paronychia franciscana
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Plantae
(unranked):	Angiosperms
(unranked):	Eudicots
(unranked):	Core eudicots
Order:	Caryophyllales
Family:	Caryophyllaceae
Genus:	Paronychia
Species:	P. franciscana
Binomial name
Paronychia franciscana Eastw.

Paronychia franciscana is a species of flowering plant in the pink family known by the common names San Francisco nailwort, California Whitlow-wort, Franciscan paronychia,^[1] and Chilean nailwort.^[2] It is native to Chile, but it was first described from specimens collected in San Francisco, California, in the United States, where it is an introduced species.^[3]

This species is a mat-forming perennial herb growing from a woody caudex. The branching stems stretch prostrate along the ground, reaching up to 50 centimetres (20 inches) in length. The fleshy, somewhat hairy leaves are up to a centimeter long, including their spiny tips. They cover the stems densely. The inflorescence is a tightly packed cyme of 2 to 6 flowers emerging from between leaves. They have no petals, but five tiny green to reddish sepals. The fruit is a utricle just over a millimeter long.^[4][5]

This species' native range is in mainland Chile. It is present as an introduction and a weed in the Juan Fernández Islands, particularly Robinson Crusoe Island and Alejandro Selkirk Island, off the Chilean coast. It is also a non-native weed in New South Wales and Victoria in Australia.^[6] It has been known from the San Francisco Bay Area since 1887,^[4] where it was a common introduced plant growing on the grounds of the Presidio before it ever had a name. Botanist Alice Eastwood used California specimens to give the plant its formal name.^[3]

References