Easily grown in wet soils in full sun. Needs full sun for best flowering. Plant tuber-like corms in boggy soils, on wet pond or stream margins or in shallow water (2-6”). Plant corms in containers for use in water gardens. Freely self-seeds in optimum growing conditions, sometimes to the point of being very aggressive.
Water plantain is a rhizomatous, Missouri native, marginal aquatic perennial that typically occurs along the muddy margins of or emersed in shallow water near the edges of ponds, streams, sloughs, marshes and ditches. Plants growing in water typically exhibit lax, often narrow, foliage whereas plants growing on muddy margins exhibit erect foliage. Whorls of tiny white flowers (1/4” diameter) appear in summer in large, branched panicles atop flowering stems growing well above the foliage to 2-3’ tall. Flowering stems rise from the centers of basal rosettes of long-stalked, broad ovate to lance-shaped, gray-green leaves (blades typically to 6-8” long). Common name and specific epithet are in reference to the similarity of the leaves to those of the unrelated true plantains (genus Plantago). Leaves may cause skin irritations. Alisma triviale and Alsima plantago-aquatica var. americanum are synonymous (Steyermark’s Flora of Missouri, Volume 1, designates this plant as the former whereas the RHS Index of Plants and Hortus Third designate it as the latter).
No serious insect or disease problems.
Water gardens. Pond or stream margins. Boggy, marshy areas.
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