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PRIMULACEAE

Lysimachia

Source:

SSA

Description:

Herbs, mostly perennial. Leaves alternate, opposite or whorled. Flowers usually in spicate racemes, sometimes in panicles, dirty white, dark red or purple. Calyx divided almost to base; segments 5 or 6, oblong. Corolla usually longer than calyx; tube subcylindric or campanulate; lobes longer than tube. Stamens arising from corolla tube, included or exserted; filaments glabrous; staminodes rarely present. Ovary superior, globose or ovoid; style cylindric, +/- as long as corolla; stigma minutely 3-lobed. Capsule surrounded by persistent calyx and with persistent style, opening by 5 valves at apex, rarely irregularly dehiscent. Seed brown, 3-angled. x = 12 (8, 9, 10, 14, 17) (high polyploidy, B-chromosomes).

Distribution:

Species 150-200, chiefly in Europe, Asia and North America; 2 in sthn Afr., Northern Province, Mpumalanga, Swaziland, KwaZulu-Natal and Eastern Cape.

Anagallis

Source:

SSA

Description:

Herbs, creeping or erect. Leaves opposite or alternate, rarely 3-nate, sessile or shortly petioled. Flowers usually axillary and solitary on slender pedicels, rarely in a lax raceme. Calyx 5-partite; segments lanceolate or subulate, spreading. Corolla 5-partite; segments obovate or linear. Stamens arising at base of corolla and shorter than it; filaments usually bearded. Ovary superior, globose; style simple. Capsule enclosed in persistent calyx and with persistent style, circumscissile or indehiscent. Seeds ellipsoid, 3-angled or 3-winged or with a circular wing forming a concave face and deeply keeled on other side. x = 10, 11 (7) (high polyploidy).

Distribution:

Species 20-30, fairly cosmopolitan, mostly under relatively moist conditions; 4 in sthn Afr., Swaziland, Lesotho, all provinces of South Africa except Northern Cape.

Ardisiandra

Hook.f.

Description:

Pilose creeping perennial herbs with leafy stems. Leaves alternate, orbicular, coarsely 5-9-lobed and toothed, petiolate. Flowers in few-flowered, extra-axillary, short-peduncled racemes, pedicellate and bracteate, inconspicuous. Calyx: segments 5, free or somewhat accrescent, persistent. Corolla campanulate, with 5 lobes +/- as long as corolla. Stamens 5, opposite petals; filaments short, connate below into a continuous ring fused at base to corolla tube; anthers apiculate. Ovary multi-ovulate. Capsule globose, dehiscent by 5 apical valves or indehiscent, many-seeded; seeds angular, blackish, papillose.

Distribution:

Species 3, endemic to the mountains of trop. Africa; sthn trop. Afr. 2, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Mozambique.

Source:

SSTA

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PRIMULACEAE