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Electronic Flora of South Australia
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Electronic Flora of South Australia genus Fact Sheet

Family: Primulaceae
Samolus

Citation: L., Sp. Pl. 171 (1753).

Derivation: Latin name of some marsh plants mentioned by Pliny.

Synonymy: Not Applicable

Common name: None

Description:
Perennial herbs, rarely with a slightly woody base, often with runners, with stems terete; leaves in a more or less clear basal rosette and/or along one to several erect branches terminating in an inflorescence, spirally arranged, sessile or petiolate.

Inflorescence a raceme or corymb, with bracts usually distinctly shorter than the leaves below; calyx with 5 persistent smooth lobes; corolla tubular, with 5 spreading lobes; stamens 5, opposite the petals and alternating with the linear staminodes, all partly fused to the corolla tube; ovary semi-inferior.

Capsule splitting along the sutures of the 5 carpels, each valve being opposite and almost as long as the calyx lobes.

Distribution:  Cosmopolitan; about 15 species found mainly in the Southern Hemisphere.

Biology: No text

Key to Species:
1. Flowering inflorescence a raceme; cauline leaves obovate to spathulate
S. eremaeus 1.
1. Flowering inflorescence a corymb, or if racemose then cauline leaves linear-elliptic to linear-oblanceolate
S. repens 2.

Author: Not yet available


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