Flora of North America species comparison

usually many-branched, sometimes unbranched, often twining among vegetation, sometimes rooting at nodes, 5–25(–70) cm.

erect to decumbent or prostrate.

in a basal rosette and cauline, basal usually quickly deciduous, (1–)2–5 × (0.2–)0.5–1.5 cm;

petiole 0–0.6 cm;

blade oblanceolate, linear-lanceolate to linear distally, margins few toothed to pinnately lobed to sinuate-dentate distally.

usually deciduous, usually alternate or opposite, sometimes whorled, simple, usually cauline, sometimes basal and forming rosettes;

stipules present, intrapetiolar, usually caducous, relatively small, or absent (tribes Epilobieae and Onagreae);

sessile or subsessile to petiolate;

blade margins usually entire, toothed, or pinnately lobed, rarely bipinnately lobed.

axillary, flowers solitary, leafy spikes, racemes, or panicles.

1–few opening per day near sunset;

buds often twisted, free tips coherent;

floral tube (37–)45–60(–65) mm;

sepals (16–)18–26(–30) mm;

petals lemon-yellow, fading orange-red to reddish purple, usually elliptic, sometimes oblanceolate, (18–)21–30(–32) mm;

filaments 15–18(–22) mm, anthers red, 6–13 mm;

style (55–)65–86(–94) mm, stigma exserted beyond anthers at anthesis.

usually bisexual, (protandrous in Chamaenerion, Clarkia, Epilobium, [and most species of Lopezia]; protogynous in Circaea and Fuchsia), sometimes unisexual (gynodioecious or dioecious, [subdioecious]), usually actinomorphic, sometimes zygomorphic, (2–)4(–7)-merous;

perianth and androecium epigynous;

sepals persistent after anthesis (in Ludwigia), or all flower parts deciduous after anthesis;

floral tube present or absent in Chamaenerion, Ludwigia, [and most species of Lopezia];

sepals usually green or red, rarely pink or purple, valvate;

petals present, rarely absent, often fading darker with age, imbricate or convolute, sometimes clawed;

nectary present;

stamens 2 times as many as sepals and in 2 series, antisepalous set usually longer, rarely all equal (Chamaenerion), or as many as sepals, [in Lopezia reduced to 2 or 1 plus 1 sterile staminode];

filaments distinct;

anthers usually versatile, sometimes basifixed, dithecal, polysporangiate, with tapetal septa, sometimes also with parenchymatous septa, opening by longitudinal slits, pollen grains united by viscin threads, (2 or)3(–5)-aperturate, shed singly or in tetrads or polyads;

ovary inferior, usually with as many carpels and locules as sepals, rarely 1 or 2 (Circaea and Gayophytum), septa sometimes thin or absent at maturity;

placentation axile or parietal;

style 1, stigma 1, with as many lobes as sepals or clavate to globose, papillate or not, and wet with free-running secretions to dry without the secretions;

ovules 1 to numerous per locule, in 1 or several rows or clustered, anatropous, bitegmic.

a loculicidal capsule or indehiscent berry or nutlike.

woody, narrowly ovoid to ovoid, 4-angled, 8–13(–16) × 3–4 mm, apex tapering to a short sterile beak 2–3 mm, valves with a prominent, broad midrib and capsule appearing 8-ribbed, tardily dehiscent ca. 1/3 capsule length.

2–2.5(–3.3) × 1.2–1.5 mm, sometimes with a small wing at distal end or a raised ridge along one longitudinal margin.

smooth or sculptured, sometimes with a coma or wings, with straight, oily embryo, 4-nucleate embryo sac, endosperm absent.

= 14, 28.