Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Perennial herbs, sometimes somewhat woody at base.

Stems: Stems prostrate, flowering branches erect or ascending.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves compound (odd-pinnate). Alternate. Petiolate. Stipules adnate to petioles.

Flowers: Flowers in capitate or spicate cymes. Flowers bisexual (perfect) or sometimes unisexual (and then plants gynodioecious). Receptacle deeply concave, enclosing the carpels, externally with 2–4 or numerous usually barbed spines, rarely spines rudimentary. Calyx of (3)4(–7) distinct sepals. Corolla (petals) absent. Stamens 2–5, rarely more. Ovary superior, carpels 1–2, connate; stigmas prominent, plumose.

Fruit: Fruit of 1–2 achenes; enclosed by the hard persistent receptacle.

Ploidy:

Habitat:

Elevation Range: