Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Dysphania ambrosioides
Common name
Mexican Tea, Wormseed
Family
Chenopodiaceae
Where found
Disturbed sites. Coastal north from Jervis Bay. Occasionally elsewhere.
Notes
Introduced annual or perennial herb to 1 m tall. Stems grooved, with short hairs, or hairless. Leaves highly aromatic, smelling of crushed ants or like turpentine, alternating up the stems, 3-20 cm long, 10-50 mm wide, upper surface hairless, lower surface covered in yellow glandular hairs or resin dots, margins lobed or toothed, tips pointed. Flowers small, green, single or in small clusters, in leafy or virtually leafless branched clusters to 40 cm long. The topmost flowers of the cluster bisexual, 1-1.5 mm in diameter, with 5 green 'petals' fused at the base. Lateral flowers female, 0.5-1 mm in diameter, with 5 green 'petals' fused for almost their entire length and enclosing the ripe seed. Flowers Summer to Autumn.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Dysphania~ambrosioides (accessed 12 January, 2019)
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