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

Rubiaceae - Rubioideae - Spermacoceae - *Diodia L.

Description :

  • Annual or perennial herbs, often diffusely branched with slender, angled branches
  • Leaves sessile or subsessile; blades linear to ovate; stipules with 3-6 setose lobes and sheathing at base
  • Flowers axillary, small, solitary or verticillate
  • Calyx 2-4-lobed with lobes persistent, or disepalous; tube ovoid to obovoid
  • Corolla usually 4-lobed, white; lobes short, valvate; tube funnel-shaped, membranous
  • Stamens usually 4, arising in throat of corolla tube, exserted; anthers dorsifixed
  • Ovary usually 2-locular, with 1 ovule in each locule attached at ± middle of septum; style slender, exserted, bidentate at apex; stigma subcapitate
  • Fruit separating into indehiscent mericarps, with pericarp not adnate to seed
  • x = 7 (polyploidy)

Nomenclature:

  • *Diodia L.
    • Linnaeus: 104 (1753)
    • Linnaeus: 45 (1754)
    • Sonder: 23 (1865)
    • Hiern: 230 (1877)
    • Verdcourt: 162 (1989)

Distribution & Notes:

  • Global : Species ± 30, tropical and warm regions of America and Africa
  • Southern Africa : Species 1: * Diodia dasycephala Cham. & Schltdl. is a roadside weed in Eastern Cape

References:

  • HIERN, W.P. 1877. Rubiaceae . Flora of tropical Africa 3
  • LINNAEUS, C. 1753. Species plantarum . Laurentius Salvius, Stockholm.
  • LINNAEUS, C. 1754. Genera plantarum , edn 5. Laurentius Salvius, Stockholm
  • SONDER, O.W. 1865. Rubiaceae . Flora capensis 3
  • VERDCOURT, B. 1989. Rubiaceae . Flora zambesiaca 5,1