Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Annual or perennial herbs or sometimes subshrubs.

Stems:

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Alternate. Margins entire. 1-veined or, if more, the veins parallel. Sessile.

Flowers: Flowers in helicoid cymes, these often open and diffuse. Flowers bisexual (perfect), actinomorphic. Calyx of 5 sepals; sepals entire or glandular-toothed. Corolla of 5 petals, longer than sepals, clawed, distinct. Stamens 5, occasionally alternating with 5 tooth-like staminodes; filaments connate at base; anthers dithecal, opening by longitudinal slits. Ovary superior, placentation axile; ovules 2 per carpel, pendulous, anatropous; stigma terminal.

Fruit: Capsules; usually 10–celled; dehiscing into 10 or sometimes 5 parts; often with a short beak. Seeds flat.

Ploidy:

Habitat:

Elevation Range: