7965.000 Ruellia L.

STEPHANOPHYSUM Pohl

Bailey, L.H. (1949) Manual of Cultivated Plants Revised edition. Macmillan, New York.

Fayaz, F. (2011) Encyclopedia of Tropical Plants Firefly Books, New Zealand

Description of the genus

Perennial herbs, erect or prostrate, or shrubs. Leaves simple, opposite, petiolate or sessile; margins entire. Inflorescence axillary or terminal; either solitary or in cymes or panicles; bracts inconspicuous. Flowers often showy in cultivated species, red, yellow, purple or white. Calyx deeply 5-partite; lobes linear or lanceolate. Corolla tube usually straight, with 5 ± equal lobes. Stamens 4, didynamous. Fruit a capsule. Seeds 4-20 flattened, ovate or orbicular on strong retinacula.

Derivation of name: After Jean de la Ruelle, 1474 - 1537, French physician and botanist.

Worldwide: 250 species in tropical and temperate regions.

Zimbabwe: 4 cultivated taxa.

Ruellia makoyana

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

SpeciesContent
brevifolia (Pohl) EzcurraImage
elegans Poir.
makoyana ClosonImage
simplex C. WrightImage

Other sources of information about Ruellia:

External websites:

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

Copyright: Mark Hyde, Bart Wursten, Petra Ballings and Meg Coates Palgrave, 2002-25

Hyde, M.A., Wursten, B.T., Ballings, P. & Coates Palgrave, M. (2025). Flora of Zimbabwe: Cultivated plants: genus page: Ruellia.
https://www.zimbabweflora.co.zw/cult/genus.php?genus_id=1337, retrieved 1 April 2025

Site software last modified: 8 February 2025 11:20pm (GMT +2)
Terms of use