eFloras Results For Monadenium      
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      FZ volume:9 part:5 (2001) Euphorbiaceae by S. Carter & L.C. Leach
      Description  Notes  
      (Search other Kew databases for: Monadenium) 
      Monadenium Pax   Key 
      in Bot. Jahrb. Syst. 19: 126 (1894). —N.E. Brown in F.T.A. 6, 1: 450 
      (1911). —Bally, Genus Monadenium: 14 (1961). —S. Carter in F.T.E.A., 
      Euphorbiaceae, part 2: 540–564 (1988). —Webster in Ann. Missouri Bot. 
      Gard.: 81 (1994). —Radcliffe-Smith, Gen. Euphorbiacearum: 417 (2001). 
      Synonyms: 
      Lortia Rendle

      in J. Bot. 36: 29 (1898).
      Stenadenium Pax

      in Bot. Jahrb. Syst. 30: 343 (1901). —N.E. Brown in F.T.A. 6, 1: 448 
      (1911). —Brenan, Check-list For. Trees Shrubs Tang. Terr.: 227 (1949).
      Range:
      A well-defined genus with currently over 70 species recognised, of which 
      20 occur in the Flora Zambesiaca area.Distribution is generally sparse, 
      but extends throughout the eastern tropical regions of Africa, from 
      northern Somalia southwards to the Northern Province of South Africa and 
      westwards into Angola. 
      Description:
      Small trees, shrubs or perennial herbs, often geophytic (with aerial parts 
      dying back after the growing season) in the Flora Zambesiaca area, with 
      fleshy or succulent stems and branches and with caustic milky latex, 
      monoecious; roots thick and fleshy, often tuberous.Leaves sometimes 
      fleshy, glabrous or hairy, with stipules apparently absent, or 
      occasionally modified as glands or spines.Cymes axillary, with sessile 
      cyathia branching dichotomously, or cyathia rarely solitary; bracts 
      persistent, paired, free, or partly united along the ventral margin to 
      form an incomplete bract-cup and enveloping the involucre.Cyathia with 
      numerous male flowers in 5 groups surrounding a solitary female flower and 
      all enclosed within a cup-like involucre.Involucres with glands fused to 
      form an entire rim deeply notched on the dorsal side, and surrounding the 
      5 fringed lobes.Male flowers in 5 groups, bracteolate, scarcely 
      exserted.Female flower pedicellate; perianth reduced to a rim below the 
      ovary, rarely shortly 3-lobed; styles 3, joined at the base, stigmas 
      bifid.Capsule exserted through the notch in the glandular rim, 
      dehiscent.Seeds with or without a caruncle. 
      Notes:
      The genus is distinguished primarily by the entire, horseshoe-shaped 
      involucral gland, which has a wide rim extended to protect the ovary 
      exserted through the notch.The persistent bracts, which envelope the 
      involucre, are usually united behind the glandular rim and are sometimes 
      large and showy.The seeds are usually oblong, with a relatively large 
      mushroom-shaped caruncle capping the apex, or sometimes ovoid in some 
      geophytic species and either with or without a rounded caruncle.In the 
      Flora Zambesiaca area, the habit ranges from small geophytes to herbs or 
      shrubs with stems ± fleshy, or occasionally strongly succulent. 
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