Campanulaceae |
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Plants herbs, subshrubs, ahrubs or trees, with milky latex. Leaves usually alternate, rarely opposite or verticillate, without stipules. Inflorescences varied, cymose, paniculate, racemose, spikelike, or headlike or of solitary flowers. Flowers bisexual. usually protandrous; calyx lobes, valvate; corollas united, sometimes only basally, varying from radially to bilaterally symmetric, (3-)5(-10)-merous, bilaterally symmetric flowers usually 2- or 1-lipped, with a distinct tube, this sometimes split on one side, sometimes resupinate, lobes of all flowers valvate in bud; stamens free or adnate to the corollas, alternating with the corolla lobes in radially symmetric flowers; anthers introrse, usually free in radially cymmetric flowers, usually united into a tube in bilaterally symmetric flowers; ovaries usually more or less inferior, rarely superior, 2-10-celled; ovules few to many, axile; styles 1, with pollen collecting hairs on the upper portion. Fruits capsules, dehiscing by apical or lateral valves or pores, rarely by a lid, or berries; seeds 1-many, embryos straight. The family Campanulaceae as described above includes the Lobeliaceae, a treatment that was often suggested on morphological and anatomical grounds. Molecular approaches support the combination of the two. The enlarged family includes about 65 genera and 1700 species. It is mostly tropical and subtropical in its distribution.
E. Nasir (1984) Campanulaceae. Flora of Pakistan 155: 1-22. Plants annual or perennial herbs, sometimes with molky latex; roots and rhizomes often thickened and tuberous; stems erect, decumbent, trailing, or climbing. Leaves simple, usually alternate, sometimes alternate. Flowers usally bisexual, radially symmetric, sometimes cleistogamous; calyx tubes adnate to the ovary, lobes linear to triangular or lanceolate; corollas united, campanulate to funnel-form or tubular, 5-lobed, the lobes sometimes split to the base; stamens 5, with flattened filaments; ovaries inferior, with (2-)3-5 cells and numerous ovules; styles thick, with (2)3 stigmas. Fruits capsules dehiscing by 2 or more valves. The above description is of what is now considered Campanulaceae subf. Campuloideae. It does not include the Lobelioideae because, at the time it was written, the subfamilies Campuloideae and Lobelioideae were considered two distinct but closely related famililies. It still works for Pakistan's native and established species because the Lobelioideae is only known there from cultivated plants. Three genera of Campanulaceae subf. Campuloideae grow in Pakistan: Codonopsis, Asyneuma, and Campanula. |
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