Stylidium uliginosum is a dicotyledon

Dicotyledon

The dicotyledons, also known as dicots, are a group of flowering plants whose seed typically has two embryonic leaves or cotyledons. There are around 199,350 species within this group...

ous plant

Plant

Plants are living organisms belonging to the kingdom Plantae. Precise definitions of the kingdom vary, but as the term is used here, plants include familiar organisms such as trees, flowers, herbs, bushes, grasses, vines, ferns, mosses, and green algae. The group is also called green plants or...

 that belongs to the genus

Genus

In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...

 Stylidium (family Stylidiaceae

Stylidiaceae

The family Stylidiaceae is a taxon of dicotyledonous flowering plants. It consists of five genera with over 240 species, most of which are endemic to Australia and New Zealand. Members of Stylidiaceae are typically grass-like herbs or small shrubs and can be perennials or annuals...

) and is one of the few species in the genus that is not native to Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

. It is an erect annual plant

Annual plant

An annual plant is a plant that usually germinates, flowers, and dies in a year or season. True annuals will only live longer than a year if they are prevented from setting seed...

 that grows from 4 to 15 cm tall. Obovate

Leaf shape

In botany, leaf shape is characterised with the following terms :* Acicular : Slender and pointed, needle-like* Acuminate : Tapering to a long point...

 or elliptical leaves, about 7-16 per plant, form basal rosettes

Rosette (botany)

In botany, a rosette is a circular arrangement of leaves, with all the leaves at a single height.Though rosettes usually sit near the soil, their structure is an example of a modified stem.-Function:...

 around compressed stems. The leaves are generally 4.5-11 mm long and 2-4.5 mm wide. This species generally has one to seven scapes

Scape (botany)

In botany, scapes are leafless flowering stems that rise from the ground. Scapes can have a single flower or many flowers, depending on the species....

 and cymose inflorescence

Inflorescence

An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Strictly, it is the part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed and which is accordingly modified...

s that are 4-15 cm long. Flowers are white. S. uliginosum is endemic to Southeast Asia

Southeast Asia

Southeast Asia, South-East Asia, South East Asia or Southeastern Asia is a subregion of Asia, consisting of the countries that are geographically south of China, east of India, west of New Guinea and north of Australia. The region lies on the intersection of geological plates, with heavy seismic...

 and has a wide distribution, ranging from Thailand

Thailand

Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...

 to the Guangdong

Guangdong

Guangdong is a province on the South China Sea coast of the People's Republic of China. The province was previously often written with the alternative English name Kwangtung Province...

 province of southern China

China

Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

. The type location

Biological type

In biology, a type is one particular specimen of an organism to which the scientific name of that organism is formally attached...

 is in Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...

, but it may be extinct there now. Earlier reports list this species as also occurring in Queensland

Queensland

Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...

 and other parts of Australia, but this was before subsequent revisions revealed those occurrences in Australia were really a different species, S. tenerum

Stylidium tenerum

Stylidium tenerum, the swamp triggerplant, is a dicotyledonous plant that belongs to the genus Stylidium that was described by Curt Polycarp Joachim Sprengel in 1826. Robert Brown had described this species in 1810 under the name S. tenellum, a name which had already been used for another species...

, that resembled S. uliginosum. Its typical habitats include sandy, moist soils in open savannah and sandy earth banks at an altitude of less than 200 metres. It flowers from October to March. S. uliginosum is most closely related to S. kunthii

Stylidium kunthii

Stylidium kunthii is a dicotyledonous plant that belongs to the genus Stylidium and is one of the few species in the genus that is not native to Australia. It is an erect annual plant that grows from 8 to 20 cm tall. Obovate, orbicular, or obleanceolate leaves, about 5-15 per plant, form...

and S. tenerum.