Japanese name: ネナシカズラ（根無葛） Scientific name:Cuscuta japonica
[Overview]
A twining annual found in sunny hills and fields.
It is a parasitic plant without chlorophyll and has many kinds of hosts.
Immediately after germination it puts roots into the soil, extends its stem, and searches for a host plant while the stem tip makes circling movements.
When the stem of Nenashi-kazura touches the stem of a host, it coils around it as if tightening, produces parasitic roots, and begins to absorb water and nutrients from the host.
Once the parasitic roots appear, the roots in the ground wither.
If it cannot parasitize a host within a few days of germination, it dies.
The stem is thick, about 1.5 mm across, wiry, yellow or tinged with purplish brown, and usually has purplish-brown spots.
Parasitic roots emerge from the stem and absorb nutrients from the host.
The leaves are alternate, reduced to triangular scales 2 mm or less in length.
It produces short spike-like inflorescences.
The flowers are small, about 3–3.5 mm long, white, with a bell-shaped corolla that is 5-lobed.
The calyx is split to the base.
The fruit is an oblong capsule 4–5 mm long, splitting crosswise in the lower part.
The fruit at first is covered by the corolla, which later falls off.
[Uses]
The squeezed juice of the stems and the seeds are used medicinally.
