Alternative names: Not Applicable

Description:
Annual or perennial herbs, rarely with a slightly woody base; leaves opposite or alternate, entire, exstipulate.

Flowers borne singly in leaf axils or in racemose inflorescences, 5-merous; calyx scarcely fused, persistent; corolla connate basally, with filaments more or less fused to it; ovary superior to semi-inferior, 1-celled, with few to many ovules around an often swollen free central placenta; style simple and with an often capitate stigma; fruit a capsule. Cosmopolitan; about 20 genera and 1,000 species, particularly well represented in north temperate regions.

Biology: No text

Key to Genera:

2. Capsule dehiscing by vertical splits; leaves linear-lanceolate	ASTEROLINON 2.
1. Stems terete; perennials; flowers borne in a terminal inflorescence. SAMOLUS 3

Author: Prepared by H. R. Toelken