Bergeranthus

Compact tufted perennials, branching from base into clumps, with tuberous rootstock. Leaves opposite, shortly connate at base, crowded, triquetrous to awl-shaped, mucronate, up to +/- 130 mm long, 20 mm broad, surface dark green; epidermis +/- smooth, stomata hardly sunken, surface even or somewhat elevated above subhypodermal tannin idioblasts. Flowers on pedicels with sheathing bracts in dichotomous cymes, but axillary flowers sometimes suppressed, +/- 50 mm diameter, bracteate; opening from late afternoon to early evening, closing before midnight. Sepals 5, lanceolate, 3-angled, keeled with membranous margins. Petals in several series, linear-lanceolate, yellow, reddish on outer surface. Stamens erect, epapillate. Nectary a crenate ring. Ovary conical above; placentas parietal; stigmas 5, filiform or subulate, longer than stamens. Fruit a 5-locular capsule, close to Mitrophyllum type; with a well-developed broad spongy closing ledge; expanding keels in a more tangential position; broad, dark brown, with membranous points; covering membranes rigid; closing bodies large, somewhat trigonous. Seeds globose, pear-shaped or triangular-ovoid. x = 9 (aneuploids, polyploidy). F lowering almost any time of the year. D istinguishing characters: tufted perennials; leaves triquetrous, smooth; inflorescences cymose; pedicels bracteate; fruit with large, white closing bodies.