Ruppia cirrhosa
Encyclopedia
Ruppia cirrhosa is a species of aquatic plant
Aquatic plant
Aquatic plants are plants that have adapted to living in aquatic environments. They are also referred to as hydrophytes or aquatic macrophytes. These plants require special adaptations for living submerged in water, or at the water's surface. Aquatic plants can only grow in water or in soil that is...

 known by the common name spiral ditchgrass. It is native to the Americas and Europe, where it grows in freshwater
Freshwater
Fresh water is naturally occurring water on the Earth's surface in ice sheets, ice caps, glaciers, bogs, ponds, lakes, rivers and streams, and underground as groundwater in aquifers and underground streams. Fresh water is generally characterized by having low concentrations of dissolved salts and...

 bodies, such as lakes. It is a thread-thin, grasslike perennial herb which grows from a rhizome
Rhizome
In botany and dendrology, a rhizome is a characteristically horizontal stem of a plant that is usually found underground, often sending out roots and shoots from its nodes...

 anchored in the wet substrate. It produces a long, narrow 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...

 tipped with two tiny flowers. As the fruit develops the peduncle
Peduncle (botany)
In botany, a peduncle is a stem supporting an inflorescence, or after fecundation, an infructescence.The peduncle is a stem, usually green and without leaves, though sometimes colored or supporting small leaves...

of the inflorescence curls into a neat spiral.

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