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

Portulacaceae - Talinum Adans.

Description :

  • Shrubs or undershrubs with annual branches from a perennial base, often with fleshy tuberous roots
  • Leaves alternate, rarely subopposite or rosulate, succulent, terete, subterete or flat, linear to broadly elliptic, obovate, petiolate; stipules linear, setaceous, usually keeled, with membranous margin, usually caducous
  • Inflorescences terminal or axillary cymes, racemes, panicles, or rarely flowers solitary
  • Flowers bisexual
  • Sepals 2, narrowly ovate to broadly ovate, herbaceous, keeled, slightly hooded at apex, green, usually with membranous margin, deciduous or rarely subpersistent
  • Petals (4)5(-7), ovate, often faintly keeled at apex, free or connate at base, ephemeral
  • Stamens 10-30(-50), attached to base of petals, hypogynous; filaments usually connate at base
  • Ovary superior, 1-locular with 3 carpels; ovules 10-40, on free-central placenta; style cylindrical or 0, with 3 stigmatic lobes
  • Fruit a chartaceous capsule, 1-locular, many-seeded, ovoid to conical, shiny yellow, dehiscing by 3(6) ± deciduous valves
  • Seeds reniform or lenticular, dark brown, black or greyish and laterally compressed or nearly globular, smooth or tuberculate, pitted or ridged, with distinct hilum, with a small aril near base; embryo annular
  • x = 12 (polyploidy)

Nomenclature:

  • Talinum Adans.
    • Adanson: 245 (1763)
    • Jussieu: 312 (1789)
    • Kunth: 75 (1823)
    • Candolle: 356 (1828)
    • Fenzl: 950 (1839)
    • Bentham: 157 (1862)
    • Sonder: 385 (1862)
    • Oliver: 149 (1868)
    • Pax: 56 (1889)
    • Burtt Davy: 166 (1926)
    • Poellnitz: 112 (1933)
    • Poellnitz: 1 (1934)
    • Pax & Hoffmann: 248 (1934)
    • Wild: 369 (1961)
    • Tölken: 19 (1969)
    • Wild & Diniz: 7 (1973)
    • McNeill: 727 (1974)
    • Nyananyo: 239 (1990)
    • Carolin: 552 (1993)
    • Eliasson: 49 (1996)

Distribution & Notes:

  • Global : Species ± 40, widespread in Africa, North and South America
    • Section Talinum with ± 14 species in North and South America and in Africa
  • Southern Africa : Species 5, indigenous in summer-rainfall areas: Namibia, Botswana, Northern Province, North-West, Gauteng, Mpumalanga, Swaziland, Free State, KwaZulu-Natal and Northern Cape
    • * Talinum paniculatum (Jacq.) Gaertn. from North America has been recorded as a garden escape in Gauteng, Swaziland, KwaZulu-Natal and Eastern Cape

References:

  • ADANSON, M. 1763. Famille les Pourpiers. Portulaceae . Familles des plantes 2. Vincent, Paris
  • BENTHAM, G. 1862. Portulaceae . In G. Bentham & J.D. Hooker, Genera plantarum 1. Lovell Reeve & Co., London
  • BURTT DAVY, J. 1926. Portulacaceae . A manual of the flowering plants and ferns of the Transvaal with Swaziland 1. Longmans, Green & Co., London
  • CANDOLLE, A.P. DE. 1828. Portulaceae . Prodromus 3. Treuttel & Würtz, Paris
  • CAROLIN, R.C. 1993. Portulacaceae . In K. Kubitzki, J.G. Rohwer & V. Bittrich, The families and genera of vascular plants - dicotyledons 2. Springer-Verlag, Berlin
  • ELIASSON, U.H. 1996. Portulacaceae . Flora of Ecuador 55
  • FENZL, E. 1839. Ordo Portulacaceae . In S.L. Endlicher, Genera plantarum secundum ordines naturales disposita 2. Beck, Vienna
  • JUSSIEU, A.L. DE. 1789. Portulaceae , les Portulacées. Genera plantarum secundum ordines naturales disposita . Herissant & Barrois, Paris
  • KUNTH, C.S. 1823. Portulaceae . In A. de Humboldt, A. Bonpland & C.S. Kunth, Nova genera et species plantarum 6. Libraria Graeco-Latino-Germanica, Paris
  • MCNEILL, J. 1974. Synopsis of a revised classification of the Portulacaceae . Taxon 23
  • NYANANYO, B.L. 1990. Tribal and generic relationship in the Portulacaceae (CENTROSPERMAE). Feddes Repertorium 101
  • OLIVER, D. 1868. Portulaceae . Flora of tropical Africa 1
  • PAX, F. 1889. Portulacaceae . Die natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien 3,1b
  • PAX, F. & HOFFMANN, K. 1934. Portulacaceae . Die natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien , edn 2,16c
  • POELLNITZ, K. VON. 1933. Zur Kenntnis der Gattung Talinum Adans. ( Portulacaceae ). Berichte der Deutschen Botanischen Gesellschaft 51
  • POELLNITZ, K. VON. 1934. Monographie der Gattung Talinum Adans. Feddes Repertorium 35
  • SONDER, O.W. 1862. Portulacaceae . Flora capensis 2
  • TÖLKEN, H.R. 1969. The genus Talinum ( Portulacaceae ) in southern Africa. Bothalia 10
  • WILD, H. 1961. Portulacaceae . Flora zambesiaca 1
  • WILD, H. & DINIZ, M.A. 1973. Portulacaceae . Flora de Moçambique 21

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