Common Name: NITRARIA FAMILY
Habit: Perennial herb [shrub], fleshy. Stem: branched. Leaf: alternate, simple to irregularly divided, occasionally toothed or lobed; stipules minute or leaf-like. Inflorescence: flowers 1 [or in cymes]. Flower: radial, bisexual; sepals 3--5; petals 3--5; stamens (10)15; ovary superior, chambers 2--6, each with [1,6] many ovules, style at tip or basal. Fruit: capsule [berry, drupe].
Genera In Family: 4 genera, 16 species: generally +- arid regions, northern hemisphere, Australia. Note: Based on molecular, anatomical, and morphological evidence, The Angiosperm Phylogeny Group (2003) indicates that Peganum and Nitraria, sometimes placed in Zygophyllaceae, are widely separated from Zygophyllaceae sensu stricto, and probably should be placed in a different family, in a different order (Sapindales) than Zygophyllaceae (Zygophyllales).
eFlora Treatment Author: Duncan M. Porter
Scientific Editor: Thomas J. Rosatti.

Common Name: HARMAL
Habit: Plant < 1 m; branches, leaves dense. Stem: from woody rhizome, herbaceous. Leaf: alternate, deeply, irregularly 2-ternately or ternately-pinnately lobed, fleshy; lobes 2--6 cm, linear, acute to abruptly soft pointed; stipules 1--4 mm, bristle- or leaf-like, deciduous or not. Flower: sepals 4--5, leaf-like, entire to irregularly, deeply pinnately lobed, persistent, linear or lobes linear, acute to abruptly soft pointed; petals 4--5, white to yellow; stamens 12--15, filaments linear, bases dilated; ovary spheric, chambers (2)3(4), each many-ovuled. Fruit: capsule +- spheric, leathery, irregularly loculicidal; chambers (2)3(4); style persisting as beak > fruit body. Seed: many per chamber, triangular, dark, curved.
Etymology: (Name used by Theophrastus for "rues")