Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Annual or perennial herbs with yellow or orange latex.

Stems: Caulescent, stems 1 to several, erect or ascending, glaucous, smooth to densely prickly.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Alternate. Blades variously lobed or pinnatifid. Base sessile. Surfaces glaucous, prickly or hispid. Margins dentate. Petioles absent. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers terminal, solitary or in cymes. Flowers bisexual (perfect), actinomorphic. Calyx of (2)3(–6)speals; sepals smooth to prickly or hispid, each with a subterminal horn tipped by a prickle, caducous, distinct. Petals usually 6 in 2 whorls of 3, yellow, golden, lavender, or white, distinct. Stamens 20 to numerous, distinct; filaments yellow, red, or lavender; anthers linear, coiled after dehiscence, dithecal, opening by longitudinal slits. Ovary superior, 3–7-carpellate, 1-celled; ovule placentation parietal; stigma 3–7-lobed.

Fruit: Capsules oblong or fusiform; opening by 4–7 valves usually ca. ⅓ the capsules length. Seeds small; numerous; subglobose; reticulate; endosperm oily.

Ploidy:

Habitat:

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