Fallopia scandens
 
False Buckwheat

Stipule

Highway # 982, Near Intersection With Highway # 9
06-August-2020

The stipule forms a sheath around the stem. This kind of stipule is called an ocrea.  Note the ocrea base is scabrid but is not fringed with reflexed hairs and slender bristles.

Scandens: Answers to key questions in Budd's Flora, Vascular Flora of Alberta: An Illustrated Guide, Flora of North America, and University of Saskatchewan Virtual Herbarium of  Plants at Risk in Saskatchewan leading to this species. 

plants perennial or annual; NOT [plants annual]

stems nearly terete; NOT [stems sharply angled]

ocreae bases glabrous or scabrid; NOT [ocreae bases fringed with reflexed hairs and slender bristles]

fruiting tepals to 15 mm long; NOT [fruiting tepals to 5 mm long]

fruiting tepals with (0.7) 1.5-2.1 mm wide wings extending down the stalk, their edges wavy or rippled (rarely flat) and variously lobed or torn (rarely smooth); NOT [fruiting tepals wingless or rarely with 0.4-0.9 mm wide wings]

fruiting tepals glabrous; NOT [fruiting tepals glabrous or with blunt, hyaline hairs]

achenes smooth, shiny; NOT [achenes minutely granular-tuberculate, dull]

 

Fallopia: Answers to key questions in Budd's Flora and Vascular Flora of Alberta: An Illustrated Guide leading to this genus. 

stems twining or sprawling; NOT [stems mostly erect, ascending, not twining]

leaves mainly on the stem; NOT [leaves mostly basal]

leaves broad; NOT [leaves linear, lanceolate or oblong], NOT [leaves round to kidney-shaped]

leaves hastate at base or heart-shaped

leaves with stipules that encircle/sheath the stem (ocreae); NOT [leaves without stipules sheathing the stem]

ocreae never 2-lobed near the tip; NOT [ocreae 2-lobed near the tip]

ocreae papery and thin but not transparent; NOT [ocreae often nearly transparent]

ocreae tan to brownish; NOT [ocreae silvery]

flowers clusters without a whorl of bracts; NOT [flower clusters with whorl of leafy to scale-like bracts at the base]

flowers perfect

tepals 5

outer tepals winged or keeled; NOT [outer tepals neither winged nor keeled]

inner tepals rarely enlarged in fruit; NOT [inner tepals usually enlarged in fruit]

stamens 6-8

achenes completely enclosed  by tepals or barely extending beyond them; NOT [achenes clearly extending beyond the tepals]

achenes more or less unwinged; NOT [achenes lens-shaped, broadly winged]

 

Polygonaceae: Answers to key questions in Budd's Flora  leading to this family. 

herbs; NOT [shrubs or trees]

land plants; NOT [water plants]

plants not parasitic on trees

plants with more than one pair of leaves; NOT [plants with a single pair of large reniform leaves]

leaves alternate; NOT [leaves opposite]

stipules present

stipules forming a sheath above nodes

flowers perfect