Malvaceae
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Authority
Britton, Nathaniel L. & Millspaugh, Charles F. 1920. The Bahama Flora.
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Family
Malvaceae
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Scientific Name
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Description
Description - Herbs or shrubs (sometimes trees in tropical regions), with alternate leaves. Stipules small, deciduous. Flowers regular, usually perfect, often large. Sepals 5 (rarely 3 or 4), more or less united, usually valvate; calyx often bracted at the base. Petals 5, hypogynous, convolute. Stamens co, hypogynous, forming a central column around the pistil, united with the bases of the petals; anthers 1-celled. Ovary severalcelled; styles united below, distinct above, and generally projecting beyond the stamen-column, mostly as many as the cavities of the ovary. Fruit capsular (rarely a berry), several-celled, the carpels falling away entire or else loculicidally dehiscent. Seeds reniform. globose or obovoid; embryo curved; cotyledons large, plicate or conduplicate. About 45 genera and 900 species, widely distributed.