Shrubs or small trees, with white latex and with simple or forked spines. Branches repeatedly dichotomously branched. Stipules 0. Leaves opposite. Flowers in terminal corymbs or 1-5-flowered cymes. Calyx lobes imbricate, free to base. Corolla salver-shaped; tube cylindric; lobes contorted, overlapping either to left or right. Stamens inserted at middle or towards top of corolla tube; anthers subsessile, glabrous. Ovary with 2 carpels, with 1-4 or rarely many ovules per loculus. Fruit an ellipsoid or ovoid berry. Seeds discoid or flattened-ellipsoid, velutinous. Worldwide: 37 species in the warm Old World, eastwards to Australia and New Caledonia Botswana: 2 taxa. Insects associated with this genus:
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Species | FZ divisions | Content |
bispinosa (L.) Desf. ex Brenan subsp. bispinosa var. bispinosa | N,SE | Description, Image |
spinarum L. | N | Description, Image |