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Acanthoideae

(Subfamily)

Overview

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A Subfamily in the Kingdom Plantae.

Photos

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Taxonomy

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The Subfamily Acanthoideae is a member of the Family Acanthaceae. Here is the complete "parentage" of Acanthoideae:

The Subfamily Acanthoideae is further organized into finer groupings including:

Genera

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Acanthus

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Aconitum

Herbs, perennial, from tubers or elongate, fascicled roots. Leaves basal and cauline, proximal leaves petiolate, distal leaves sessile or nearly so; cauline leaves alternate. Leaf blade palmately divided into 3-7 segments, ultimate segments narrowly elliptic or lanceolate to linear, margins incised and toothed. Inflorescences terminal, sometimes also axillary, 1-32(-more) racemes or panicles, to 28 cm; bracts leaflike, not forming involucre. Flowers bisexual, bilaterally symmetric; sepals not persistent in fruit; lower sepals (pendents) 2, plane, 6-20 mm; lateral sepals 2, round-reniform; upper sepal (hood) 1, saccate, arched, crescent-shaped or hemispheric to rounded-conic or tall and cylindric, usually beaked, 10-50 mm; petals 2, distinct, bearing near apex a capitate to coiled spur, concealed in hood, long-clawed; nectary present, on spur; stamens 25-50; filaments with base expanded; staminodes absent between stamens and pistils; pistils 3(-5), simple; ovules 10-20 per pistil; style present. Fruits follicles, aggregate, sessile, oblong, sides prominently transversely veined; beak terminal, straight, 2-3 mm. Seeds deltoid, usually with small, transverse, membranous lamellae. x =8.[1] [more]

Andrographis

Andrographis paniculata is a plant in the family Acanthaceae, native to India and Sri Lanka. [more]

Anisacanthus

Anisacanthus is a genus of plants in the family native to tropical and subtropical regions of the Americas, and sometimes cultivated for use in xeriscape landscaping. They are sometimes known as "desert honeysuckles", though this term is shared with the genus Ancistranthus, and is something of a misnomer as true honeysuckles belong to the family Caprifoliaceae. [more]

Anisodus

Subshrubs or perennial herbs, glabrous or pubescent with simple and dendritic hairs. Roots stout, fleshy. Stems erect, obtusely angular, di- or trichotomously branched. Leaves solitary or paired, petiolate, simple, entire or coarsely dentate. Inflorescences solitary flowers in leaf axils. Flowers mostly nodding, somewhat actinomorphic or calyx 2-lipped. Calyx mostly funnelform, evidently 10-veined, 4- or 5-lobed; lobes unequal, variable in shape and length. Corolla campanulate, lobes quincuncial, included or exserted from calyx. Stamens shorter than corolla, inserted near base of corolla tube; filaments usually glabrous at base; anthers dehiscing longitudinally. Ovary conical, 2-locular, with a disclike nectary. Fruiting pedicel thickened or elongated. Fruiting calyx becoming enlarged, turbinate or campanulate, sometimes elongated beyond fruit, with main veins prominent and pleated. Fruit a globose or ovoid capsule, circumscissile above middle or dehiscent at apex. Seeds numerous, compressed.[2] [more]

Aphelandra

Aphelandra is a of about 170 species of flowering plants in the family Acanthaceae, native to tropical regions of the Americas. [more]

Aphyllanthes

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Apium

Herbs, annual or biennial, glabrous. Stem erect, ridged and shallowly fluted. Leaves petiolate, with membranous sheaths; leaf blade pinnate to ternate-pinnately compound. Umbels compound, loose to subcompact; peduncles usually short or abortive; bracts and bracteoles absent; rays few, spreading-ascending or spreading; umbellules few-flowered. Petals white or greenish-yellow, ovate to suborbicular, apex narrow, inflexed. Calyx teeth obsolete. Stylopodium low-conic to depressed; styles short, erect to reflexed. Fruit globose to ellipsoid, rounded at both ends, slightly compressed laterally, mericarp nearly rounded in cross section, commissural face constricted, glabrous; ribs 5, prominent, acute; vittae 1 in each furrow, 2 on commissure. Seed face plane. Carpophore stout, entire or bifid at the apex.[3] [more]

Apodytes

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Apollonias

Apollonias is a genus of belonging to the Laurel family, Lauraceae. The genus includes from one to ten species of evergreen trees and shrubs, depending on circumscription; recent studies (e.g. Rohwer 1993, van der Werff 2003) have limited the genus to just one species, with the others transferred to Beilschmiedia. [more]

Aponogeton

Herbs with milky sap. Leaves sheathing at base; axillary scales present. Inflorescences branched [unbranched], projected above water. Flowers bilaterally symmetric, sessile; stamens 6--18--[50]; filaments distinct; anthers 2-locular; pistils 2--6[--9], sessile. Fruits: beak terminal [lateral], curved or straight. Seeds: endosperm absent; seed coat single or double. x = 8.[4] [more]

Astilbe

erbs perennial. Rhizomes thick. Stems brown paleaceous hairy or long pilose. Leaves alternate, long petiolate, 2-4 × ternately compound, rarely simple; stipules membranous; leaflets lanceolate, ovate, or broadly ovate to elliptic, margin dentate. Inflorescence a terminal panicle, bracteate. Flowers white, lilac, or purple, bisexual or unisexual, rarely plants polygamous or dioecious. Sepals (4 or) 5. Petals usually 1-5, sometimes more or absent. Stamens usually (5 or) 8-10. Carpels 2(or 3), ± connate or free; ovary subsuperior or semi-inferior, 2(or 3) -loculed with axile placentation or 1-loculed with marginal placentation; ovules many. Fruit a capsule or follicle. Seeds small.[5] [more]

Asystasia

The Asystasia belongs to the family Acanthaceae and comprises approximately 70 species found in the tropics, including the weedy species Asystasia gangetica. [more]

Barleria

Barleria is a genus of plants in the family . [more]

Blechum

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Blepharis

Blepharis is a genus of in family Acanthaceae. It contains the following species (but this list may be incomplete): [more]

Bravaisia

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Campanula

Plants perennial or annual, erect trailing or decumbent, glabrous, pubescent, or hirsute. Leaves simple, alternate or forming rosettes at the base. Inflorescence 1-many flowered, with racemes or spikes. Flowers blue to purple or white. Sepals 5, with or without reflexed appendages between lobes; calyx tube adnate to the ovary, segments 5-lobed. Corolla campanulate, funnel-shaped or tubular. Stamens 5, free, filaments dilated at the base. Ovary 3-locular; style cylindrical; stigmas 3. Fruit a capsule, elongated to ovoid, obovoid or round, with membran¬ous walls; dehiscence by irregular pores at the bases or the sides. Seeds minute, numerous.[6] [more]

Carlowrightia

Carlowrightia is a genus of in family Acanthaceae. These plants are sometimes known as wrightworts. They are mainly small shrubs bearing inflorescences of lilylike flowers. They are native to the Americas, with many species found in western North America. The genus was named for the American botanist Charles Wright. [more]

Crocus

Herbs small, perennial, cormous. Corms oblate, covered with a tunic. Leaves few, all basal, green, linear, adaxially with pale, median stripe, base surrounded by membranous, sheathlike leaves. Aerial stem not developed. Flowers emerging from ground, with peduncle and ovary subterranean. Perianth white, yellow, or lilac to dark purple; tube long, slender; segments similar, equal or subequal. Stamens inserted in throat of perianth tube. Style 1, slender, distally with 3 to many branches. Capsule small, ellipsoid or oblong-ellipsoid.[7] [more]

Crossandra

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Daphne

Shrubs or subshrubs, evergreen or deciduous. Branches glabrous or pubescent. Leaves mostly alternate, sometimes opposite; petiole short. Inflorescence usually terminal, sometimes axillary, capitate or shortly racemose, sometimes paniculate, racemose, or spicate, with or without involucre; peduncle short or absent. Flowers bisexual or unisexual (plants sometimes dioecious), 4- or 5-merous. Calyx tube white, pink, or yellow, rarely mauve, campanulate, cylindric, or slightly funnel-shaped, exterior glabrous or pubescent; lobes 4 or 5, erect or spreading, alternately longer and shorter. Petaloid appendages absent. Stamens twice as many as calyx lobes, in two series; filaments short or absent; anthers oblong, included; connectives indistinct. Disk absent or annular, cup-shaped, sometimes elongated on one side. Ovary usually sessile or slightly stipitate, ovoid, 1-loculed; style terminal, short; stigma capitate. Fruit a succulent berry or dry and leathery, sometimes enclosed by persistent calyx, sometimes naked, usually red or yellow. Seed testa crustaceous, endosperm scanty or absent; cotyledons fleshy.[8] [more]

Dicliptera

Dicliptera is a genus of plants in the family . Dactylostegium is sometimes included herein. [more]

Dyschoriste

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Eranthemum

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Graptophyllum

Graptophyllum is a genus of plants in the family . One of the species in this genus is G. pictum, the Caricature plant. Another species is the Graptophyllum ilicifolium, the Mount Blackwood Holly[1]. [more]

Hemigraphis

Hemigraphis is a genus of plants in the family , consisting of about 30 species native to tropical Asia. Hemigraphis is sometimes included in the genus Strobilanthes [more]

Hygrophila

Hygrophila, commonly known as the temple plants or hygros, is a genus of flowering plants in the family . There are about 125 species, of which about 40 are aquatic. The genus has a pan-tropical distribution, with some members entering sub-tropical areas. It is one of only two genera in its family that contains aquatic plants, the other being Justicia. The genus is treated inside the tribe Hygrophileae, which is noted as being in need of revision at the genus level, meaning the current taxonomic boundaries of Hygrophila are likely to change in the future. [more]

Hymenandra

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Hymenocallis

Herbs, perennial, scapose, from bulbs. Bulb 1, ovoid or globose, tunicate, often extending into neck of clasping, distichous leaf bases. Leaves 2-16, deciduous or evergreen, sessile, rarely petiolate; blade narrowly to widely liguliform or oblanceolate, rarely ovate to elliptic. Scape: bracts 2-3, triangular, ovate, or lanceolate. Inflorescences umbellate, bracteate; each flower with subtending, often narrowly lanceolate bract. Flowers 1-16, usually sessile, erect or slightly diverging, large and starlike, fragrant; perianth connate basally into short or long tube, surmounted by conspicuous staminal corona; tepals extending from base of corona, free portions reflexed or ascending, often distally recurved, linear; stamens adnate basally into showy funnelform or rotate corona, margins between free portions of filaments often dentate or lacerate, portions of filaments inserted on margin of corona, erect to incurved, filiform; anthers versatile, introrse, pollen yellow, often golden, or orange; ovary inferior, globose, ovoid, oblong, or pyriform, ovules 2-10 per locule; style exserted beyond stamens, deflexed laterally, filiform; stigma capitate. Fruits capsular, green, subglobose to elongate, 3-locular, large, leathery. Seeds large, green, fleshy. x = 20, 23.[9] [more]

Hymenophyllum

Plants epiphytic or on rock. Stems long-creeping, intertwining, threadlike; hairs brown, sparse. Roots few, delicate. Leaves 1--3-pinnatifid, 2--6 × 0.5--1.5 cm. Petiole short, threadlike, not winged. Blade with inconspicuous glandular hairs or prominent stellate hairs; margins entire to distantly dentate. Soral involucres 2-valved, the halves roundish to ovate. Sporangial receptacle a low mound of tissue included within involucre. Gametophytes persistent, ribbonlike, much branched. Gametophyte gemmae platelike or absent.[10] [more]

Hymenoxys

Annuals, biennials, or perennials, 5-150 cm (sometimes with ± branched, woody caudices or stout rhizomes). Stems 1-30+, erect, unbranched or branched, green throughout to purple-red-tinted proximally or distally to purple-red-tinted throughout, glabrous or ± hairy. Leaves alternate; blades simple or 1-2-pinnately lobed, ultimate margins entire or toothed, faces glabrous or hairy, usually ± gland-dotted (often in pits). Heads radiate [discoid], borne singly or in paniculiform to corymbiform arrays. Involucres subhemispheric, hemispheric, globoid, campanulate, or urceolate, (2.5-) 6-32 mm diam. Phyllaries persistent (or inner falling), usually (6-) 16-30(-40) in 2 series and unequal, sometimes 28-50 in 2-3 series and subequal (usually spreading to erect in fruit). Receptacles usually hemispheric, globoid, ovoid, or conic (flat in H. ambigens), smooth or pitted, epaleate. Ray florets usually (3-) 8-13(-16), sometimes 14-34 [0], pistillate, fertile; corollas (usually withering after flowering, falling early or tardily) yellow or yellow-orange to orange (laminae fan-shaped, lobes 3-5). Disc florets usually 25-150(-400+), usually bisexual and fertile (6-15, functionally staminate in H. ambigens) ; corollas yellow to yellow-brown proximally, yellow distally, tubes shorter than cylindric to cylindric-campanulate throats, lobes 5, ± deltate. Cypselae obconic or obpyramidal, glabrous or hairy; pappi 0, or persistent, of 2-11(-15) usually aristate scales. x = 15.[11] [more]

Hypericum

[Trees or] shrubs, subshrubs, or perennial herbs, glabrous or with simple hairs, with translucent ("pale") and often opaque, black or reddish ("dark") glands, laminar (immersed and sometimes abaxial) and marginal or intramarginal. Leaves opposite [or whorled], sessile or short petiolate, venation pinnate to palmate [or rarely dichotomous], margin entire or gland-fringed. Inflorescence cymose. Flowers bisexual, homostylous [or heterostylous], stellate or cupped. Sepals 5 and quincuncial or rarely 4 and decussate, unequal or equal, free or partly united. Petals (4 or) 5, contorted, golden to lemon yellow [or rarely white], abaxially sometimes tinged or veined red, persistent or deciduous after