Family: Lamiaceae
Plectranthus
Citation:
L'Hér., Stirp. Novae 4:84, tt. 41, 42 (1788).
Derivation: Greek plektron, a cock's spur; anthos, a flower; alluding to the basal spur of the corolla in some species.
Synonymy: Not Applicable Common name: Plectranthus.
Description:
Perennial shrubs with quadrangular branches becoming tough and slightly woody towards the base, with simple hairs, gland-tipped hairs and sometimes with larger subsessile glands; leaves petiolate, opposite, crenate to lobed.
Inflorescence a thyrse usually on a distinct peduncle, with sessile cymose part-inflorescences each usually with a few pedicellate flowers, with elongated internodes between flowering nodes, with bracts scale-like; sepals more or less equally connate, zygomorphic, with single hairs and subsessile glands on the outside; corolla 2-lipped, with a posterior lip short and broad, with the anterior lip oblong-elliptic; with 2 short lateral lobes and a 2-lobed central one; stamens 4 fertile, inserted in the throat of the corolla tube; anthers with 2 cells fertile, not diverging, more or less enclosed in the anterior lip; ovary deeply 4-lobed, with each locule with 1 basal ovule, with a gynobasic style and a terminal 2-fid stigma.
Fruit usually with 4 mericarps each about orbicular in surface view, centripetally compressed and without keels, with the attachment scar short and narrow, basal.
Distribution:
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About 250 species from Africa through southern Asia to Japan, through Malesia and the Pacific to Australia. Blake (1971) Contr. QM Herb. 9:1-120 recognised 17 species in Australia.
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Biology:
No text
Author:
Not yet available
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