Slipper Grass, a Chinese medicinal herb. It is the whole herb of the Compositae plant Stellaria media. It has the functions of clearing heat, detoxifying, and diuresis. It is used for abscesses, boils, and urinary tract infections. It is harvested in summer, washed, and used fresh or dried.
【Morphology of Slipper Grass】
Slipper grass is a perennial herbaceous plant with no stems or woody fruit. It grows up to 20cm tall. The whole plant is hairless and contains latex. The roots are tuberous, fleshy, and cylindrical. It has no stems or very short stems.
The leaves are basal or rosette-like, almost without petioles; the leaf blades are narrow-elongated-ovate, inverted-ovate-elliptic, spoon-shaped, lanceolate-ovate, spoon-shaped, lanceolate, or linear. They are about 5-7cm long and about 1cm wide, with blunt or acute apices, wavy margins, and finely toothed edges, rarely shallowly lobed like feathers.
The peduncles of the flowers are solitary or in small numbers, erect, and arranged in umbel-like inflorescences; the involucre is cylindrical, becoming bell-shaped in fruiting period, about 1cm long; the involucre bracts are multilayered, with small ovate outer bracts and lanceolate-linear inner bracts; all are ligulate flowers, with various colors, and the apices are 5-toothed.
The achene is cylindrical, about 2mm long, with 4-5 distinct longitudinal ridges; the pappus is white, longer than the achene. It flowers in summer.
【Habitat and Distribution of Slipper Grass】
Ecological environment: Slipper grass grows on mountain grasslands and roadsides.
Resource distribution: Slipper grass is distributed in Guangxi, Sichuan, Yunnan, and other places.
