Names: Greek; poly means many and goni means knee or joint.
English: Buckwheat family; Knotweed family; Smartweed family.
Botany: 50 genera, 1200 species; north temperate zone; some fruits possess hooks; perennial herbs, swollen nodes; leaves simple, with a pair of fused, sheathing stipules, ochrea; flowers bisexual, small; sepals petaloid, thickened, enlarged around the developing fruit, lack a corolla; ovary three united carpels, single locule, one ovule, superior with basal or free-central placentation; some of the worst weeds.
Content: anthraquinones; tannins; saponins.
DD: Oxygen,
Causticum,
Chlorum,
Lanthanides.
TaxonomyPolygonaceae Symmeria
Afrobrunnichia
Eriogonoideae: Brunnichia, Antigon
Neomillspaughia, Coccoloba
Podopterus
Leptogonum
Ruprechtia, Triplaris, Gymnopodium, Gilmania
Pterostegia, Eriogonum, Chorizanthe
Polygonoideae Persicaria
Bistorta, Rubrivena
Aconogonon, Koenigia
Fagopyrum, Parapteropyrum
Calligonum, Pteropyrum, Pteroxygonum
Oxyria, Rheum, Emex, Rumex
Knorringia.Atraphaxis, Polygonella, Polygonum.
Reynoutria, Fallopia, Muehlenbeckia.