Drumheads

Polygala cruciata L. Sp. PL 706. 1753
Polvgala cuspidata Hook. Jour. Bot. Hook. 1: 194. 1834. Not P. cuspidata DC. 1824.
Pol'vgala missurica Raf. New Fl. 4: 89. 1838.
Sexilia missurica Raf.; B. D. Jackson. Ind. Kew. 2: 894, as synonym. 1895.
Polygala cruciata ramosior Nash; B. L. Robinson, in A. Gray, Syn. Fl. N. Am. I 1 : 458. 1897.
Slender erect annual, 0.6-3.6 dm. high, simple or usually cymosely branched; leaves in whorls of 3 or 4 throughout or the uppermost scattered, linear to linear-elliptic, the upper largest, 0.8-3.5 cm. long, 1-5 mm. wide, usually apiculate at the obtuse or rounded apex, narrowed at base; peduncles 0.1-5 cm. long; racemes thick-cylindric or ovoid-cylindric, obtuse, or apiculate, 1-1.7 cm. thick, the axis 6 cm. long or less; bracts subulate-attenuate from an ovate base, ciliolate, spreading, persistent, 1.5-2.5 mm. long; pedicels 2-2.4 mm. long; flowers rosy-purple or greenish, rarely white; sepals ovate, obtuse to acutish, ciliolate, 0.8-1.4 mm. long; wings broadly deltoid-ovate, 3.5-5.6 mm. long, 2.7-3.6 mm. wide near base, subsessile or very shortly clawed at the truncate or slightly oblique base, acuminate and strongly cuspidate (cusp 0.6-1.3 mm. long), about 9-nerved; keel 2.8-3.5 mm. long, the crest on each side of a lamella and 2-3 entire or bifid lobes; capsule suborbicular, very plump, strongly oblique and winged below on the stipe-like base, 2-2.2 mm. long, 1.8-2.1 mm. wide; seed ellipsoid, plump, short-pubescent, 1.1-1.3 mm. long; aril 0.9-1.1 mm. long, the 2 linear lobes appressed.
Type locality: Virginia.
Distribution: Southern Maine to Minnesota, south to Florida and Louisiana.

Polygala cruciata, commonly called drumheads milkwort, is a species of flowering plant in the milkwort family. It is native to eastern North America, where it is found in scattered localities, particularly around the Coastal Plain, the Great Lakes, and the southern Appalachian Mountains. It is found most often in wet, sandy prairies and marshes.

It is an annual that produces pink-purple flowers in the summer.