Habit: Biennial, perennial herb [shrub], glabrous or hairy.
Leaf: mostly basal or all cauline, 0.5--1.5 cm wide, lance-linear to elliptic, sessile, margin with small, gland-tipped teeth; cauline alternate.
Inflorescence: raceme [or spike or panicle].
Flower: bilateral, inverted in full bloom by twisted pedicel; corolla red, blue (or white), tube entire or with an upper sinus, limb strongly 2-lipped, 2 lobes of upper lip < 3 of lower; stamens fused, generally 2 smaller anthers each with terminal tuft of bristles, 1 sometimes triangular or horn-like, others linear, shorter; ovary +- spheric, chambers 2, placentas 2, axile.
Fruit: spheric, valves 2, at top, within sepals, short.
Species In Genus: +- 350 species: +- worldwide.
Etymology: (Matthias de l'Obel, Flemish botanist, 1538--1616)
Jepson eFlora Author: Tina Ayers
Index of California Plant Names (ICPN; linked via the Jepson Online Interchange)Key to Lobelia
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