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Sarcozona J.M.Black

Reference
Trans.& Proc.Roy.Soc.South Australia 58:176, t. XI, fig. 2. (1934)
Name Status
Current

Scientific Description

Common name. Pigfaces. Family Aizoaceae.

Habit and leaf form. Small, erect or semi-prostrate shrubs. Plants succulent. Leaves cauline. Plants with neither basal nor terminal concentrations of leaves. Young stems angled. Stem internodes solid. Xerophytic. Leaves minute to medium-sized; opposite; fleshy; imbricate to not imbricate; shortly petiolate to sessile; connate (ensheathing stem, and persistent); simple; epulvinate. Leaf blades entire; often solid; one-veined, or pinnately veined, or palmately veined. Leaves with stipules, or without stipules. Leaf blade margins entire. Vegetative buds not scaly. Leaves without a persistent basal meristem. Leaf anatomy. Hairs absent. Extra-floral nectaries absent. Stem anatomy. Secondary thickening developing from a conventional cambial ring, or anomalous; via concentric cambia.

Reproductive type, pollination. Fertile flowers hermaphrodite. Unisexual flowers absent. Plants hermaphrodite. Entomophilous (diurnal).

Inflorescence and flower features. Flowers solitary, or aggregated in ‘inflorescences’; in cymes, or in heads. The terminal inflorescence unit cymose. Inflorescences terminal (on branchlets at right angles to the main stems); with involucral bracts (this bilobed and fleshy, partly enclosing the flowers). Flowers pedicellate (A), or sessile (A); ebracteate; ebracteolate; small, or medium-sized; regular; cyclic; polycyclic. Free hypanthium present; incorporation calyx, staminodes and stamens. Perianth sepaline (considered apetalous, with colourful, conspicuous staminodal ‘petals’); 5; 1 -whorled. Calyx present; 5; 1 -whorled; gamosepalous; unequal but not bilabiate (two members large and opposite, and three smaller with membranous margins); fleshy; persistent. Corolla absent. Androecium 50–200 (‘many’). Androecial members branched. Androecial sequence determinable, or not determinable. Androecial members when branched/many, maturing centrifugally; free of one another, or coherent; 3–16 -whorled (i.e to ‘many whorls’). Androecium including staminodes. Staminodes 20–50 (many, outside the stamens); petaloid (pale pink to white). Stamens 20–100 (many); polystemonous; filantherous. Anthers dehiscing via longitudinal slits; introrse; tetrasporangiate. Pollen shed as single grains. Gynoecium 4–5 carpelled. The pistil 4–5 celled. Gynoecium syncarpous; synovarious to synstylovarious; inferior. Ovary plurilocular; 4–5 locular. Gynoecium stylate. Styles 4–5; apical. Stigmas 4–5. Placentation parietal. Ovules 20–50 per locule (many); anatropous, or campylotropous.

Fruit and seed features. Fruit fleshy; indehiscent; a capsule, or a berry; 4–5 celled; 20–100 seeded (many). Seeds non-endospermic. Perisperm present (mealy). Embryo well differentiated. Cotyledons 2. Embryo curved.

Etymology. From the Greek for "flesh" and "involucre", referring to the fleshy involucre which surrounds the calyx tube.

J. Gathe and Leslie Watson, 8 September 2016

Taxonomic Literature

  • Australia. Bureau of Flora and Fauna 1989. Flora of Australia. Volume 3, Hamamelidales to Casuarinales. Australian Govt. Pub. Service.. Canberra..
  • Blackall, William E.; Grieve, Brian J. 1988. How to know Western Australian wildflowers : a key to the flora of the extratropical regions of Western Australia. Part I : Dicotyledons (Casuarinaceae to Chenopodiaceae). University of W.A. Press.. [Perth]..