Maireana Moq.

Scientific Description

Common name. Bluebushes. Family Chenopodiaceae.

Habit and leaf form. Shrubs, or herbs. Plants succulent; unarmed. Perennial (herb to small, woody, perennial shrub). Leaves cauline. Plants with a basal concentration of leaves, or with neither basal nor terminal concentrations of leaves. Stems not ‘jointed’. Stem internodes solid. Helophytic to xerophytic. Leaves minute to large; alternate, or opposite; spiral, or distichous; ‘herbaceous’, or fleshy; petiolate to sessile; simple; epulvinate. Leaf blades entire; flat, or solid; often terete, or semi-terete; linear, or ovate, or obovate; attenuate at the base, or cuneate at the base, or oblique at the base, or rounded at the base. Leaves without stipules. Leaf blade margins flat, or revolute, or involute. Leaves without a persistent basal meristem. Leaf anatomy. Hydathodes present, or absent. Hairs present, or absent; complex hairs absent. Branched hairs absent. Extra-floral nectaries absent.

Reproductive type, pollination. Fertile flowers hermaphrodite, or hermaphrodite and functionally male, or hermaphrodite and functionally female. Unisexual flowers present, or absent. Plants hermaphrodite, or polygamodioecious.

Inflorescence and flower features. Flowers solitary, or aggregated in ‘inflorescences’ (then paired); when solotary, axillary. Inflorescences axillary. Flowers sessile; ebracteate; bracteolate, or ebracteolate (rarely minutely bi-bracteolate); minute, or small; regular; cyclic. Hypogynous disk present, or absent. Perianth sepaline; 5; 1 -whorled; joined (imbricate); fleshy, or non-fleshy; persistent; accrescent, or non-accrescent. Calyx present; not replaced by accrescent bracteoles; 5; gamosepalous; imbricate; cupuliform (to flat); non-fleshy; persistent (in the fruit); accrescent. The fruiting calyx not berrylike; winged. Corolla absent. Fertile stamens present, or absent. Androecial members definite in number. Androecium 5. Androecial members free of the perianth, or adnate (to the base of the perianth); all equal; free of one another; 1 -whorled. Androecium exclusively of fertile stamens. Stamens 5; all more or less similar in shape; isomerous with the perianth; oppositisepalous. Anthers bent inwards in bud; dehiscing via longitudinal slits; tetrasporangiate. Fertile gynoecium present, or absent (from male flowers). Gynoecium (2–)5 carpelled. The pistil 1 celled. Gynoecium syncarpous; synovarious to synstylovarious; superior. Ovary unilocular; 1 locular; sessile. Gynoecium stylate. Styles (1–)2–3(–4); partially joined. Stigmas 2–3. Placentation basal. Ovules in the single cavity 1; pendulous, or ascending; non-arillate; campylotropous.

Fruit and seed features. Fruit non-fleshy; indehiscent; capsular-indehiscent (a utricle); 1 celled. Gynoecia of adjoining flowers combining to form a multiple fruit, or not forming a multiple fruit. Fruit 1 seeded. Seeds more or less non-endospermic. Perisperm present. Cotyledons 2. Embryo curved (annular to horseshoe-shaped).

Etymology. After Charles Antoine Lemaire (1800–71), professor of botany at Ghent.