Lepidium perfoliatum L., Sp. Pl. 643. 1753; Babu, Herb. Fl. Dehra Dun 59. 1977.

Eng.: Clasping-leaved pepper-grass, Shield-cress.

Herbs, annual or biennial, up to 40 cm high; stems erect, unbranched, sparsely pubescent with simple setose hairs. Leaves distinctly dimorphic; basal leaves long- petioled, bipinnately dissected into narrow, linear lobes, 10 - 15 cm long, pubescent; lower cauline leaves more or less similar, but gradually smaller, sessile with expanded wing-like auricles on both sides; upper cauline leaves broadly ovate or suborbicular, sessile, entire, deeply cordate and usually overtopping, with rounded auricles at base, subacute at apex, glabrous. Racemes terminal, elongating in fruit, up to 10 cm long; pedicels filiform, glabrous, divergent, 7 - 8 mm long in fruit. Sepals spreading, pubescent, ca 1 mm long. Petals oblong-spathulate, clawed, rounded at apex, ca 1.7 mm long. Stamens 6 with minute anthers. Fruits broad-elliptic, minutely notched and narrowly winged, 3.5 - 4 x 2.5 - 3 mm, glabrous; style short, shortly protruding out of the notch. Seeds laterally compressed and distinctly winged, 1.5 - 1.75 x 1 mm; cotyledons incumbent.

Fl. & Fr. Feb. - July.

Distrib. India: Uttar Pradesh.

Southern Asia, Europe and North America.