e-Key v3 - Keetia
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Interactive keys to the identification of seed plants of southern Africa using keys based on plant morphology.

Rubiaceae - Antirheoideae - Vanguerieae - Keetia E.Phillips

Description :

  • Climbers or scandent shrubs; stems glabrous or frequently pubescent
  • Leaves paired, petiolate; stipules lanceolate to ovate or triangular at base, acuminate to linear above
  • Flowers in pedunculate, usually distinctly branched cymes; bracts and bracteoles often conspicuous
  • Calyx with tube ellipsoid to ovoid; limb equalling or sometimes longer than tube, dentate
  • Corolla white; lobes oblong-lanceolate to ovate, reflexed, acute and thickened at apex; tube cylindrical with a ring of deflexed hairs inside
  • Stamens 5, arising at throat of corolla; anthers narrowly ovate or oblong, fully or partly exserted
  • Disc pubescent
  • Ovary 2-locular, with a single, pendulous ovule in each locule; style long-exserted; pollen presenter ovoid, narrowly winged, bifid at apex
  • Fruit a 2-seeded drupe, slightly to strongly bilobed, sometimes 1-seeded by abortion and asymmetrical

Nomenclature:

  • Keetia E.Phillips
    • Phillips: 587 (1926)
    • Phillips: 369 (1927)
    • Bridson: 967 (1986)
    • Bridson: 362 (1998)

Distribution & Notes:

  • Global : Species 40, tropical Africa
  • Southern Africa : Species 1: Keetia gueinzii (Sond.) Bridson, Northern Province, Mpumalanga, Swaziland, KwaZulu-Natal and Eastern Cape

References:

  • BRIDSON, D.M. 1986. The reinstatement of the African genus Keetia ( Rubiaceae subfam. Cinchonoideae , tribe Vanguerieae ). Kew Bulletin 41
  • BRIDSON, D.M. 1998. Rubiaceae . Flora zambesiaca 5,2
  • PHILLIPS, E.P. 1926. Rubiaceae . The genera of South African flowering plants, edn 1. Memoirs of the Botanical Survey of South Africa No. 10
  • PHILLIPS, E.P. 1927. Description of three new South African plants. Bothalia 2