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Simsia annectens

Interesting Facts

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Description

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Family Compositae

The largest family of flowering plants , the Compositae (Asteraceae), comprising about 1,100 genera and more than 20,000 species and characterized by many small flowers arranged in a head looking like a single flower and subtended by an involucre of bracts. A head may consist of both ray flowers and disk flowers, as in the sunflower, of disk flowers only, as in the burdock, or of ray flowers only, as in the dandelion.

Tribe Heliantheae

The Heliantheae are a tribe of closely related genera of the sunflower family that can be readily recognized due to the association of a receptacular bract or chaff scale with each disk floret in the head . The heads usually include bisexual , actinomorphic disk florets with tubular corollas that have 4 or 5 distal lobes and also peripheral zygomorphic female or sometimes sterile florets with strap-shaped corollas that have 3 or fewer distal teeth. However, the ray flowers are sometimes absent and the heads are then discoid , containing only bisexual florets with tubular corollas. The pappus is absent or more commonly ranges from scales to stiff bristles . -- Gerald Carr.

Genus Simsia

Annuals , perennials , or subshrubs [shrubs ], 20-400 cm. Stems erect or ascending [decumbent ], sparingly to freely branched. Leaves cauline; opposite (proximal ) or alternate [whorled ]; petiolate (petioles often ± winged , often with expanded bases , those bases sometimes fused to form nodal "discs") [sessile]; blades 3-nerved from bases, mostly deltate to ovate [linear ], sometimes 3- [5-]lobed[pinnatifid ], bases cordate to cuneate, ultimate margins entire or toothed , faces hirsute , hispid , pilose , puberulent , scabrous , or scabro-hispid [sericeous ], often gland-dotted or ± stipitate-glandular to glandular-puberulent. Heads radiate [discoid ], borne singly or in 2s or 3s, or in tight to loose , corymbiform [paniculiform ] arrays. Involucres campanulate [ovoid-campanulate to urceolate ], 5-16[-22] mm diam. Phyllaries persistent , [11-]13-43[-66] in 2-4 series (tightly appressed to broadly reflexed , unequal to subequal ). Receptacles low-convex, paleate (paleae conduplicate , ± enclosing cypselae). Ray florets [0-]5-21[-45], styliferous and sterile ; corollas orange-yellow [lemon-yellow, pink, purple, or white]. Disc florets [12-]13-154[-172], bisexual , fertile ; corollas concolorous with rays (usually turning purple apically), tubes (often glandular-hairy) shorter than throats , lobes 5, ± triangular (anthers black, yellow, or yellow proximally and bronze or purple distally; style branches relatively slender, apices sometimes attenuate). Cypselae flattened, thin-margined [thickened, biconvex ] (shoulders minute to conspicuous , faces glabrous or hairy ) ; pappi 0, or fragile or readily falling, of 2 ± subulate scales [plus 4-12 shorter scales]. x = 17.

Species 20: sw United States, Mexico, West Indies (Jamaica), Central America, South America.[1]

Taxonomy

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Notes

Name Status: Accepted Name .

Comment: Data Providers: CONABIO, IPNI, MesoAmericana, Tropicos. GCC LSID: urn :lsid:compositae.org:names:DC2184BE-FC8C-4085-9E0B-8B7CC07253CA

Last scrutiny: 16-Aug-09

Similar Species

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Members of the genus Simsia

ZipcodeZoo has pages for 2 species, subspecies, varieties, forms, and cultivars in this genus:

S. calva (Awnless Bushsunflower) · S. lagasceiformis (Annual Bush Sunflower)

More Info

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Further Reading

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Notes

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Contributors

Identifiers

Footnotes

  1. David M. Spooner "Simsia". in Flora of North America Vol. 21 Page 135, 140. Oxford University Press. Online at EFloras.org. [back]
Last Revised: 7/23/2012