Duranta
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Authority
Acevedo-Rodríguez, Pedro & collaborators. 1996. Flora of St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 78: 1-581.
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Family
Verbenaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Genus Description - Erect shrubs, sometimes with axillary spines. Leaves simple, opposite or verticillate, short-petiolate, with entire or dentate margins, usually with resinous dots beneath. Rowers small, bisexual, pedicellate, in terminal racemes or panicles or seldom axillary racemes; calyx tubular to nearly bell-shaped, truncate, 5-plicate, 5-ribbed, enclosing the fruit; corolla 5-merous, nearly trumpet-shaped, with spreading unequal lobes; stamens 4, the filaments in 2 pairs of unequal length, inserted in the middle of the tube, included; ovary of 4 bilocular carpels, each locule with a single ovule, the style slender with a capitate stigma. Fruit drupaceous, yellowish, with 4 2- seeded pyrenes.
Distribution and Ecology - A genus of about 17 species, from tropical and subtemperate areas of the N e w World.