Momordica charantia |
Cucurbitaceae |
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balsam-pear, bitter-melon |
cucumber family, gourd family |
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Habit | Plants usually vines, sometimes shrublike in Cucurbita, or perennial [annual] herbs (Melothria), usually monoecious or dioecious, rarely andromonoecious (Cucumis). | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Stems | prostrate, procumbent, sprawling, trailing, or climbing; tendrils usually present, unbranched or branched. |
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Leaves | simple (also compound in Cyclanthera, Momordica), alternate, estipulate, petiolate (sessile or subsessile in Sicyos); blade unlobed or palmately, pedately, or pinnately lobed. |
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Inflorescences | paniculate, racemose, umbellate to subumbellate, fasciculate, corymbose, or solitary flowers. |
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Flowers | unisexual [bisexual]; sepals (4–)5(–6), sometimes vestigial (Cyclanthera), connate, calyx rotate, campanulate, saucer-shaped, or tubular, adnate to corolla, producing hypanthium; petals 5(–6), distinct or connate, imbricate or induplicate-valvate, usually yellow, orange, or white, sometimes green, margins entire, rarely fimbriate, corolla rotate, cupulate, campanulate, salverform, or funnelform; stamens (2–)3–5, with 4 mostly connate in pairs, appearing as only (1–)3 stamens; anthers connate or distinct, pepos, rarely capsules, elongate to globose, exocarp usually hard, sometimes fleshy and berrylike, glabrous or hairy, smooth or bristly, echinate, aculeate, muricate, tuberculate, or furrowed, indehiscent or dehiscent. |
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Seeds | mostly compressed, sometimes winged, arillate in Coccinia, Ibervillea, Momordica, and Tumamoca, exalbuminous; embryos straight. |
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Momordica charantia |
Cucurbitaceae |
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Distribution |
AL; CT; FL; GA; LA; PA; Africa
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Nearly worldwide; mostly tropical |
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Discussion | Subspecies 2 (1 in the flora). (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Genera ca. 120, species ca. 825 (23 genera, 56 species in the flora). Sechium edule (Jacquin) Swartz (chayote) has been attributed to Louisiana in the PLANTS database on the basis of a putative record in R. D. Thomas and C. M. Allen (1993–1998); there appears to be no such record therein. The only specimen from Louisiana in the NLU herbarium was collected from a cultivated plant in Ouachita Parish. Sechium edule is native to Central America and is grown worldwide as a food crop. Cucurbitaceae, together with Begoniaceae and other families, is currently placed in Cucurbitales (P. F. Stevens, www.mobot.org/MOBOT/research/APweb), in the same clade as Fabales and Rosales. The familial classification of Cucurbitaceae by C. Jeffrey (1980b, 1990, 2005) is widely used. Recent phylogenetic studies partly support the groupings outlined by Jeffrey but expected from the classification by Jeffrey’s classification (A. Kocyan et al. 2007; H. Schaefer et al. 2008); the studies suggest that tribes recognized by Jeffrey are largely monophyletic and Initial classifications by C. Jeffrey (1980b, 1990) emphasized fusion of stigmas and tendril morphology; his latest revision (2005) incorporated information from studies of seed coat anatomy by D. Singh and A. S. R. Dathan (1998). In Cucurbitoideae Kosteletzky, the main sclerenchymatous layer of the seed coat is conspicuous and distinct; in Nhandiroboideae Kosteletzky, it is inconspicuous and not clearly distinct from adjacent sclerified hypodermal layers. The largest genera in the family are Trichosanthes (ca. 100 species), Momordica (ca. 80 species), Zehneria (ca. 60 species), Cucumis (ca. 55 species), Sicyos (ca. 50 species), Cayaponia (45–75 species), and Gurania (ca. 40 species). About 40 of the genera are monospecific. Cucurbitaceae generally is easy to recognize: the fruit is usually a pepo (a hard-shelled berry). Fruits are produced in a wide array of shapes and sizes, especially as the result of millennia of selection. With intense watering, custom fertilization, and selection for size increase, squashes have been grown to 900 pounds; pumpkins can reach 1800 pounds. Cucurbitaceae were important in early agriculture in the Americas as one of the three main staple food crops––squash, corn, and beans. Squashes are all native to the New World and provide edible flesh and seeds rich in amino acids. Melons are native to Africa and Asia and are used primarily as dessert fruits. Species domesticated for food include Benincasa hispida (Thunberg) Cogniaux (wax gourd), Citrullus lanatus (watermelon), Coccinia grandis (ivy gourd), Cucumeropsis mannii Naudin (white-seeded melon), Cucumis (three species––bur gherkin, melon, and cucumber), Cucurbita (five species of squash, pumpkin, and gourd), Cyclanthera pedata (slipper gourd), Lagenaria siceraria (bottle gourd), Luffa (two species of loofah), Momordica charantia (bitter melon), Praecitrullus fistulosus (Stocks) Pangalo (tinda), Sechium edule (Jacquin) Swartz (chayote), Sicana odorifera (Vellozo) Naudin (casabanana), Telfairia Hooker (two species of oyster nut), and Trichosanthes Linnaeus (two species of snake gourd). Species planted as ornamentals include Cucumis dipsaceus Ehrenberg (teasel gourd, for its yellow, densely aculeate fruits), C. metuliferus E. Meyer ex Naudin (African horned cucumber, for its bright yellow, coarsely aculeate fruits), Cucurbita pepo (for its colorful and oddly shaped gourds), Echinocystis lobata (balsam-apple, for its massive displays of small, white flowers), Lagenaria siceraria (for its bottlelike gourds), and Thladiantha dubia (golden creeper, for its large, golden-yellow flowers). Species employed for other economic uses include Lagenaria siceraria (bottle gourd, for containers, birdhouses, floats, and musical instruments), Luffa cylindrica M. Roemer (loofah, as a sponge, scrubber, and filter), Sicana odorifera (casabanana, as an air freshener, the ripe fruits producing a long-lasting, fruity fragrance), and Siraitia grosvenorii (Swingle) C. Jeffrey ex A. M. Lu & Zhi Y. Zhang (luo han guo, as a sweetener, the fruit flesh 300 times sweeter than sugar and low in calories). (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 6, p. 8. | FNA vol. 6, p. 3. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Parent taxa | Cucurbitaceae > Momordica | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Name authority | Linnaeus: Sp. Pl. 2: 1009. (1753) | Jussieu | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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