SCROPHULARIACEAE  

Annual herbs, slender, erect, glabrous, somewhat fleshy, sometimes aquatic, branching mainly at base. Leaves opposite, crowded towards base of stem, becoming smaller, few and distant above, simple, linear-lanceolate, or oblong to ovate, entire, obscurely palmately veined. Flowers solitary in axils of upper leaves, pedicellate, chasmogamous, or sometimes lower flowers sessile to subsessile, cleistogamous; pedicels filiform, ebracteolate. Calyx tubular, 5-lobed to +/- halfway; lobes narrow, obtuse, imbricate. Corolla bilabiate; tube +/- campanulate, mouth wide; upper lip entire or 2-lobed, outside in bud; lower lip very broadly 3-lobed, mid-lobe deeply bifid; all lobes spreading. Stamens 2, posterior, included; filaments short, filiform, arising in upper part of corolla tube; anthers bithecate; thecae equal, parallel, separate, glabrous, held apart by a connective with 2 short arms (slightly stipitate); staminodes 2, anterior, minute or 0. Ovary bilocular, globose or ovoid; ovules many; style filiform, straight, persistent; stigma slightly 2-lobed, somewhat peltate. Fruit a spherical, loculicidal capsule; valves 2, entire or bifid. Seeds small, many, +/- ovate, tuberculate. x = 7.

Dwarf, submerged, turf-forming, aquatic herbs; stems branching chiefly near base, broadly 4-winged. Leaves opposite, sessile, ovate, semi-amplexicaul, acute. Flowers cleistogamous, minute, leaf-axillary, solitary, sessile, ebracteate. Calyx deeply 5(6)-lobed, accrescent; lobes oblong, obtuse, much longer than tube. Corolla bilabiate, 5-lobed, ellipsoid, +/- as long as calyx; tube sprinkled with sessile glands inside on anterior part, closed by minute lips; upper lip outside in bud, shortly 2-lobed; lower lip 3-lobed, somewhat shorter than upper. Stamens 2, anterior; filaments very short, glabrous, arising above middle of corolla tube, bithecate; thecae unequal, indehiscent or imperfectly dehiscent, connective between thecae distinct; staminodes 0. Ovary unilocular, ellipsoid-globose; ovules many; placentas parietal, bifurcate, shield-shaped; style very short; stigma somewhat thickened. Fruit an orbicular-obovate capsule, somewhat compressed on one side, septicidal at apex or bursting irregularly. Seeds many, oblong, +/- compressed, pitted.

Herbs, annual or perennial; stems usually slender, diffuse or erect, sometimes rigid. Leaves opposite or rosulate at base, with upper ones sometimes alternate, mostly petiolate, rarely sessile, variously shaped, from linear to suborbicular or sometimes oblanceolate to obovate, margins usually variously dentate, sometimes repand, pinnatifid or pinnatisect, rarely entire, usually glabrous; upper leaves often somewhat different. Flowers solitary, axillary or subfasciculate, or in terminal racemes, bracteate. Calyx 5-lobed; segments lanceolate, ovate or oblong, somewhat imbricate, slightly accrescent in fruit. Corolla usually tubular, bilabiate; tube very short, sometimes invaginated or obsolete; limb flattened, rotate or concave; posterior lip bi- or quadrifid, exterior in bud; anterior lip trifid or simple, middle or only lobe often emarginate, lobes +/- rounded; throat usually produced below anterior lip into 2 (rarely 1 or 0) pits, pouches, or spurs wherein oil-secreting trichomes are found in several species; windows (patches of translucent material) usually present, either at base of lateral corolla lobes, associated with openings to pouches or spurs, or central at base of upper lip, and there sometimes split into 2 contiguous or separate parts; very rarely windows absent; central posterior window varies in form from +/- flat to pouched or drawn out into a short hollow cone. Stamens (2)4, didynamous, arising in mouth of corolla tube; posterior pair with anthers; anterior pair usually bent near base, passing round posterior pair and coming to be in posterior position, rarely with anthers 0; some or all filaments broadened, sometimes with a projecting appendage; anthers bithecate but 1-celled as thecae confluent, usually cohering in pairs; staminodes 0(2). Ovary bilocular, usually ovoid; ovules many; style simple, terete, shorter or somewhat longer than ovary; stigma simple or capitate. Fruit an obliquely ovoid, subglobose or elongated, obtuse, septicidal capsule, not or scarcely compressed; valves inflexed at lateral margins, entire or emarginate. Seeds many, brown, usually curved, often with hollow on ventral side filled with +/- cup-shaped or bulbous outgrowth of seed coat with various apertures, usually ribbed and not winged, sometimes pitted or reticulate and/or winged, rarely straight and/or smooth to granulate or muricate. x = 9 (B-chromosomes-1 report, aneuploids, polyploidy).

Herbs, usually short-lived perennials but sometimes annuals, glabrous to villous; stems procumbent to decumbent. Leaves simple, opposite or alternate, reniform to orbicular, lobed or rarely entire, palmately veined, long-petiolate. Flowers irregular, pedicellate, solitary in leaf axils. Calyx deeply 5-lobed; lobes entire, valvate, thickened, unequal, with posterior lobe exceeding others, shorter than corolla tube. Corolla tubular, bilabiate; tube cylindrical with spur on anterior side of base; lips +/- equal, posterior lip patent, exterior in bud, anterior lip spreading with prominent basal palate occluding mouth of tube; lobes entire. Stamens 4, didynamous, included, adjacent pairs of anthers marginally coherent; staminode minute. Ovary equally bilocular, septum erect, straight; style undivided, erect; stigma scarcely clavate, entire. Fruit a +/- globose capsule, walls papery, usually many-seeded, dehiscing by several irregular, meridional fissures, from apex +/- to base. Seeds broadly ellipsoid to globose, cristate or with some tubercles, ridges usually prominent; hilum subbasal. x = 7 (6) (aneuploids, high polyploidy).

Small annual or perennial herbs; stems often prostrate or decumbent, leafy, sometimes with axillary leaf tufts (incipient branches, not brachyblasts); hairs on stems, leaves, bracts and calyx with delicately sculptured walls. Leaves opposite, bases often connate, sometimes becoming alternate towards stem apex, usually cauline, rarely radical, elliptical, rarely ovate or uppermost spathulate, petiolate, entire or at times few-dentate, pubescent or sometimes +/- glabrous. Flowers shortly pedicellate, usually crowded into racemose, +/- globose heads or short spikes, these often arranged in corymbs or panicles. Bracts adnate to pedicel and up to half of calyx tube. Calyx usually obliquely and unequally 5-lobed, sometimes 3-lobed but anterior lobes may be retuse or toothed, at least these 2 lobes broadly deltoid, lobes not indurated with age. Corolla bilabiate, 4- or 5-lobed, membranous, persistent; tube funnel-shaped, glabrous; posterior lip (and sometimes anterior lip as well) bearded with minute 1-celled, clavate hairs, 1- or 2-lobed, often with a yellow/orange patch extending down throat, exterior in bud; anterior lip 3-lobed. Stamens 4, didynamous; filaments arising +/- in middle of corolla tube, decurrent down tube; anthers unilocular, exserted. Nectary small, adnate on shorter side of ovary base. Ovary bilocular, elliptic-oblong, base slightly oblique; ovules 1 per locule, pendulous; style filiform; stigma lingulate with 2 marginal bands of stigmatic papillae. Fruit a pair of soft-walled cocci, outer face convex, smooth or rarely slightly rugose, inner face concave, indehiscent. Seeds +/- elliptical, compressed, convex on one face, +/- plane on other, amber-coloured, smooth.