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Mock strawberry (aka, Indian strawberry) flowers are borne on a single flower stalk. Flowers are 1/2-3/4" across with five sharply-pointed, triangular green sepals as long as the petals and covered with long hairs on their outer surfaces; five bright-yellow petals wider at the tip than the base; 15-25 stamens with bright yellow anthers; and a central yellow receptacle with numerous pistils covering its surface. Just below the sepals are five small bracts (leaves), each with three pointed lobes at its tip; these persist and are present below the sepals on the fruit. The fruit is a bright-red expanded receptacle ~1/2" in diameter, globose or ovoid, that is nestled in the sepals; bright red seeds project from the fruit's surface like pointed bumps. The fruit is edible but tasteless. The word "Indian" in the common name refers to the country "India" rather than Native Americans; "Indian" strawberry was introduced from Asia. The five small bracts (leaves) just below the sepals in mock strawberry, each with three pointed lobes at its tip, are present in both the flowers and the berries and are a diagnostic character of mock strawberry.

Duchesnea

Duchesnea indica

mock strawberry [Blooms: Apr-Sep]