8489.000 Rubia L.

Description of the genus

Perennial herbs, creeping or climbing. Stems 4-angled, brittle. Stems, leaf margins and petioles with recurved prickles, the whole plant tending to cling to clothing. Stipules similar to the leaves. Leaves (and leaf-like stipules) in whorls of 4-8, petiolate. Flowers in axillary or terminal cymes, bisexual, usually 5-merous. Calyx reduced to a rim; teeth 0, not enclosed in an involucre. Corolla rotate to ± campanulate, greenish to yellow. Ovary 2-locular with 1 ovule per loculus. Fruit fleshy, glabrous, consisting of two round, 1-seeded mericarps.

Derivation of name: A name in Pliny for madder

Worldwide: 60 species in the Mediterranean, Africa, temperate Asia and America

Zimbabwe: 2 taxa.

Rubia cordifolia subsp. conotricha

Links to taxa:     View: living plant images - herbarium specimen images - all images for this genus

SpeciesFZ divisionsContent
cordifolia L. subsp. conotricha (Gand.) Verdc.C,E,SDescription, Image
horrida (Thunb.) PuffW,C

Other sources of information about Rubia:

Our websites:

Flora of Botswana: Rubia
Flora of Caprivi: cultivated Rubia
Flora of Malawi: Rubia
Flora of Mozambique: Rubia
Flora of Zambia: Rubia

External websites:

African Plants: A Photo Guide (Senckenberg): Rubia
BHL (Biodiversity Heritage Library): Rubia
EOL (Encyclopedia of Life): Rubia
GBIF (Global Biodiversity Information Facility): Rubia
Google: Web - Images - Scholar
iNaturalist: Rubia
IPNI (International Plant Names Index): Rubia
JSTOR Plant Science: Rubia
Mansfeld World Database of Agricultural and Horticultural Crops: Rubia
Plants of the World Online: Rubia
Tropicos: Rubia
Wikipedia: Rubia

Copyright: Mark Hyde, Bart Wursten, Petra Ballings and Meg Coates Palgrave, 2002-24

Hyde, M.A., Wursten, B.T., Ballings, P. & Coates Palgrave, M. (2024). Flora of Zimbabwe: Genus page: Rubia.
https://www.zimbabweflora.co.zw/speciesdata/genus.php?genus_id=1426, retrieved 28 March 2024

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