''Stellaria borealis'' is a species of flowering plant in the family

Caryophyllaceae Caryophyllaceae, commonly called the pink family or carnation family, is a family of flowering plants. It is included in the dicotyledon order Caryophyllales in the APG III system, alongside 33 other families, including Amaranthaceae, Cactacea ...

known by the common name boreal starwort. It has a

circumboreal The Circumboreal Region in phytogeography is a floristic region within the Holarctic Kingdom in Eurasia and North America, as delineated by such geobotanists as Josias Braun-Blanquet and Armen Takhtajan. It is the largest floristic region in t ...

distribution, occurring throughout northern areas of the Northern Hemisphere. It occurs in many types of moist and wet habitat, including

marsh A marsh is a wetland that is dominated by herbaceous rather than woody plant species.Keddy, P.A. 2010. Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (2nd edition). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. 497 p Marshes can often be found at ...

es, riverbanks, lakesides,

floodplain A floodplain or flood plain or bottomlands is an area of land adjacent to a river which stretches from the banks of its channel to the base of the enclosing valley walls, and which experiences flooding during periods of high discharge.Goudi ...

s, talus, ditches, and moist spots in forests and woodlands. It is quite variable in appearance, especially across subspecies. In general, it is a rhizomatous perennial herb forming mats of branching, four-angled stems lined with lance-shaped leaves a few centimeters in length. The

inflorescence An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Morphologically, it is the modified part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed o ...

bears many flowers each with five deeply lobed white petals. Some flowers lack petals and have only the five pointed green

sepal A sepal () is a part of the flower of angiosperms (flowering plants). Usually green, sepals typically function as protection for the flower in bud, and often as support for the petals when in bloom., p. 106 The term ''sepalum'' was coined b ...

s. This plant is sometimes infected with the smut fungus ''

Microbotryum violaceum ''Microbotryum violaceum'', also known as the anther smut fungus, was formerly known as ''Ustilago violacea''. It is a Basidiomycete obligate parasite of many Caryophyllaceae. But it has now separated into many species due to its host specificity ...

'' (''Microbotyrum stellariae''), which causes its

anthers The stamen (plural ''stamina'' or ''stamens'') is the pollen-producing reproductive organ of a flower. Collectively the stamens form the androecium., p. 10 Morphology and terminology A stamen typically consists of a stalk called the filam ...

to turn red.Flora of North America
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References

External links

Jepson Manual Treatment: ssp. ''sitchana''Photo gallery

borealis Borealis (Latin for ''northern'' or ''of the north'') may refer to: Astronomy * Borealis Basin or North Polar Basin, a basin on the planet Mars * Borealis quadrangle, an area on the planet Mercury ** Borealis Planitia, a basin within the quadran ...

Flora of Subarctic America Flora of Canada Flora of the Northeastern United States Flora of the North-Central United States Flora of the Northwestern United States Flora of the Southwestern United States Flora without expected TNC conservation status {{Caryophyllaceae-stub