Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Unbranched or sparingly branched shrubs (endemic species) or annual or perennial herbs (introduced species).

Stems:

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Alternate. Margins entire or callose–toothed. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers (20–)50–200(–400) in terminal racemes. Flowers bisexual (perfect). Calyx 5-lobed, sepals connate, tube adnate to ovary. Calyx lobes entire or serrate, persistent, rarely auriculate. Corolla zygomorphic, dorsally cleft almost to base. Section Galeatella: corollas crimson or yellowish to greenish white, 35-90 mm long, 8-20 mm wide, tube curved to arcuate, lobes spreading. Section Revolutella: corollas blue or magenta, 15-45 mm long, 3-5 mm wide, tube suberect, lobes spirally recurved. Stamens 5, alternate with corolla lobes; anthers dithecal, opening by longitudinal slits, coherent but separating after anthesis or connate and forming a tube into which pollen is shed; filaments distinct or connate above, attached to the epigynous nectary disk or to base of corolla, rarely adnate to corolla tube. Section Galeatella: anthers with apical tufts of white hairs on all 5. Section Revolutella: anthers with apical tufts of white hairs on the lower 2. Ovary inferior, 2-celled, often crowned with an annular nectary disk; ovule placentation axile, or when 1-celled with 2 parietal placentas; stigmas wet or dry, 2-lobed, appressed and nonreceptive as the style grows through the anther tube, pushing out the pollen, after which the stigmas spread apart and become receptive.

Fruit: Loculicidal capsules; dehiscent at apex by 2 valves. Seeds numerous; with a straight; short to spatulate dicotyledonous embryo embedded in oily endosperm. Galeatella: seeds 1-3 mm long. Revolutella: seeds ca. 0.5 mm long.

Ploidy:

Habitat:

Elevation Range: