Family: Rutaceae
Eriostemon
Citation:
Smith, Trans. Linn. Soc. 4:221 (1798).
Derivation: Greek erion, wool; stemõn, thread or stamen; alluding to the woolly staminal filaments.
Synonymy: Not Applicable Common name: Wax-flowers.
Description:
Shrubs or small trees; branchlets angular or grooved decurrently between the nodes, or terete, occasionally glandular-warty, glabrous or variously hairy; leaves alternate, either with small black stipules or exstipulate, sessile or shortly petiolate; lamina more or less terete to flat, mostly thick, occasionally glandular-warty.
Inflorescence axillary or terminal, in umbel-like clusters or cymes, or flowers solitary; pedicels bracteolate; sepals 5, rarely 4, free; petals 5, rarely 4, free, ovate, elliptic or obovate, mostly white to pink, rarely red, purple to blue; stamens 10, rarely 8, usually incurved around the style; filaments mostly compressed, ciliate, pilose or glabrous; anthers versatile, with apical appendages; locules introrsely and longitudinally dehiscent; disk prominent; gynoecium 5-carpellate; carpels more or less free, 1-celled; ovules 2 per carpel; style inserted about the middle of the adaxial margins of the carpels; stigma capitate or shallowly 5-lobed.
Fruit of 1-5 erect to spreading cocci, dehiscing explosively along the adaxial and the apical margins; exocarp coriaceous or woody, mostly apically beaked; endocarp cartilaginous and responsible for seed expulsion, ejected with the seed; seeds 1, rarely 2, per coccus, more or less reniform, smooth to ornamented; outer testa thin, inner thick.
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Distribution:
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32 species endemic in southern and eastern Australia; 5 species in S.Aust.
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Biology:
No text
Key to Species:
Author:
Not yet available
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