Snow on the mountain (Euphorbia marginata)

Synonyms: Agaloma marginata, Dichrophyllum marginatum, Lepadena marginata

Common Names: smoke-on-the-prairie, variegated spurge, whitemargined spurge

Description: Plant contains a white milky latex that is toxic if ingested.

Habit: Summer annual reaching a height of 1-3 feet.

Leaves: 1-3 inches long, green in color, upper leaves develop white margins, alternate, smooth, oblanceolate, elliptic or oblong-ovate in shape, entire margins, sessile or with a short petiolate.

Stems: Light green in color becoming light yellow to reddish brown. Younge stems covered in white hairs becoming smooth with age.

Flowers: Upper stems terminate in small clusters of narrow, cup-shaped cyathia containing both male and female flowers. Inconspicuous, greenish-yellow in color, lacking sepals and petals, petal-like white bracts that are showy.

Fruit and seeds: Capsules, 6-8 mm across, sub globoid, 3-valved, covered in dense white hairs. Each valve contains 1 seed. Seeds are 3-4 mm long, ovoid, minutely tuberculate.

Habitat: Native to the Great Plains of the United States. Can be found in waste places and disturbed sites.

Reproduction: By seed.

Credits: The information provided in this factsheet was gathered from the Missouri Botanical Garden and Illinois Wildflowers.

Individual species images that appear with a number in a black box are courtesy of the Bugwood.org network (http://www.invasive.org).Individual photo author credits may not be included due to the small display size of the images and subsequent difficulty of reading the provided text. All other images appear courtesy of Google (http://images.google.com).

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