Common Name: WATERLEAF FAMILY
Habit: Annual, perennial herb, generally hairy, generally taprooted. Stem: prostrate to erect. Leaf: simple to pinnately compound, basal or cauline, alternate or opposite; stipules 0. Inflorescence: cyme, generally raceme-like and coiled, or flowers 1. Flower: bisexual, generally radial; calyx lobes generally 5, generally fused at base, generally persistent, enlarging in fruit; corolla rotate to cylindric, generally deciduous, lobes generally 5, appendages in pairs on tube between filaments or 0; stamens generally 5, epipetalous, filament base sometimes appendaged, appendages scale-like; ovary generally superior, chambers 1 or 2, placentas 2, parietal, enlarged into chamber, sometimes meeting so ovary appears 2--5-chambered, style 1, style branches 2, stigmas generally head-like. Fruit: capsule, generally loculicidal; valves generally 2.
Genera In Family: 12 genera, 240--260 species: especially western US; some cultivated (Emmenanthe, Nemophila, Phacelia). Note: Included in Boraginaceae in TJM2 and some other treatments (Angiosperm Phylogeny Group IV 2016 Bot J Linn Soc 181:1--20) but treated as separate family (excluding Namaceae) by Boraginales Working Group (Luebert et al. 2016).
eFlora Treatment Author: Genevieve K. Walden, Robert W. Patterson & Richard R. Halse, except as specified
Scientific Editor: Bruce G. Baldwin