Cuscuta pentagona: The "Dodder" That Won't Leave Home
By Jeff Cassel This post is one of a series from professor Nisse Goldberg's Plant Taxonomy students at Jacksonville University. Figure 1: Dodder stems lack chlorophyll and are easy to spot because of their orange color. Photo credit: Curtis Clark. Classification Kingdom: Plantae Division: Magnoliophyta Class: Magnoliopsida Order: Solanales Family: Cuscutacea Genus: Cuscuta Specific epithet : pentagona Common name : Fiveangled Dodder Description Figure 2: White, bell-shaped dodder flowers. Photo credit: Curtis Clark. Cuscuta pentagona , or fiveangled dodder is a parasitic climbing vine, which means that it derives its nutrients from other organisms. Fiveangled dodder can be found throughout Florida in a variety of different habitats that include hammocks, dunes, and brackish marshes. You can recognize the plant by its yellow to orange stems (Fig. 1) and white, bell-shaped flowers (Fig. 2). Because it is parasitic, dodder does not have chloroph...