Fioria Mattei

Scientific Description

Family Malvaceae.

Tribe Hisbisceae.

Habit and leaf form. Shrubs, or herbs (with an indumentum of stellate, eglandular and glandular hairs). Plants unarmed. To 1–2 m high. Mesophytic. Not heterophyllous. Leaves small to medium-sized; alternate; spiral; petiolate; non-sheathing; simple. Leaf blades dorsiventral; dissected (3–5-lobed), or entire; ovate; more or less palmately veined; cordate. Mature leaf blades adaxially pubescent; abaxially pubescent. Leaves with stipules (stipules subulate). Stipules persistent. Leaf blade margins crenate, or serrate. Leaf anatomy. Hairs present; glandular hairs present, or absent; complex hairs present. Complex hairs stellate. Extra-floral nectaries absent.

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

Inflorescence and flower features. Flowers solitary, or aggregated in ‘inflorescences’ (due to the reduction of the upper leaves); axillary; in racemes (apparently a leafy raceme). Inflorescences axillary. Flowers pedicellate (pedicels articulate); medium-sized; regular; 5 merous; tetracyclic. Hypogynous disk absent. Perianth with distinct calyx and corolla; 10; 2 -whorled; isomerous. Calyx present; 5; 1 -whorled; gamosepalous; lobed; lobulate (5-lobed); hairy; valvate; exceeded by the corolla; campanulate; regular; persistent; accrescent. Calyx lobes triangular (lobes indistinctly 3–5 ribbed). Epicalyx present (of free bracteoles). Corolla present; 5; 1 -whorled; polypetalous (adnate to the base of the staminal column); with contrasting markings (with a different colour base); yellow, or red (i.e. yellow with a red base). Petals obovate. Androecium present. Androecial members indefinite in number. Androecium 50–100 (i.e. ‘many’). Androecial members adnate; all equal; coherent (connate; the filaments fused in a column surrounding the style); 1 - adelphous (the tube attached to the petals); 1 -whorled. Androecium exclusively of fertile stamens (or rather, half-stamens, each having only a half anther). Stamens 50–100. Anthers dehiscing via longitudinal slits; introrse; unilocular. Gynoecium 5 carpelled. The pistil 5 celled. Gynoecium syncarpous; synstylovarious to eu-syncarpous; superior. Ovary plurilocular; 5 locular. Gynoecium stylate. Styles 1; more than 4-branched (5-branched); apical. Stigmas 5; clavate. Placentation axile. Ovules 2–4 per locule.

Fruit and seed features. Fruit 10–15 mm long; non-fleshy; hairy; dehiscent; a capsule (depressed globular). Capsules loculicidal (by 5 valves, margin of valves expanded into transversely veined wings). Dispersal unit the seed. Seeds not compressed (reniform in outline). Testa with tubercles.

Geography, cytology, number of species. World distribution: pantropical. Native of Australia. Not endemic to Australia. Australian states and territories: Western Australia and Queensland. Northern Botanical Province. A genus of 1 species (i.e. monotypic); 1 species in Western Australia; 0 endemic to Western Australia.

Additional comments. Often included in the genus Hibiscus.