Summary ²

Amaranthus spinosus, commonly known as the spiny amaranth, prickly amaranth or thorny amaranth. It is native to the tropical Americas, but it is present on most continents as an introduced species and sometimes a noxious weed. It can be a serious weed of rice cultivation in Asia....

Description ³

Annual herb, mostly erect, up to 1.5 m. Leaves glabrous or with sparse hairs on the main veins below, long petiolate, up to 9 cm. The leaf axils bear pairs of fine and slender spines. Flowers green in axillary clusters and branched terminal spikes. Male flowers in the apical part of the spikes.

Diagnostic ⁴

"Habit: An erect spinous herb, upto 90cm."

Sources and Credits

1. (c) Forest & Kim Starr, some rights reserved (CC BY), https://www.biolib.cz/IMG/GAL/53937.jpg
2. (c) Wikipedia, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amaranthus_spinosus
3. (c) Mark Hyde, Bart Wursten and Petra Ballings, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), http://eol.org/data_objects/30278647
4. (c) India Biodiversity Portal, some rights reserved (CC BY), http://eol.org/data_objects/26331414

More Info

• iNat taxon page
• African Plants - a photo guide
• Atlas of Living Australia
• Biodiversity Heritage Library
• BOLD Systems BIN search
• Calflora
• CalPhotos
• Catalogo de Plantas y Líquenes de Colombia
• eFloras.org
• Flora Digital de Portugal
• Flora of North America (beta)
• Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF)
• Go Botany
• HOSTS - a Database of the World's Lepidopteran Hostplants
• IPNI (with links to POWO, WFO, and BHL)
• Jepson eFlora
• Maryland Biodiversity Project
• NatureServe Explorer 2.0
• SEINet Symbiota portals
• Tropicos
• USDA PLANTS database
• VASCAN by Canadensys
• World Flora Online
• 日本のレッドデータ検索システム
• 植物和名−学名インデックス YList

Range Map

(c) Discover Life and original sources, some rights reserved (CC-BY-NC-SA)

iNat Map