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Support the Flora of the Southeastern US

2024 has been a banner year for making the best flora we can imagine. We've created:
With financial support from people like you, we are aiming even higher in 2025. Together we can accomplish all this: Vote on our 2025 priorities
  • Add Global Conservation Ranks (GRanks) vote
  • Professional graphic keys (polyclaves) to individual families/genera vote
  • 2 new FloraQuest apps: Florida & Mid-South vote
  • Image overlays highlighting diagnostic characters with arrows vote
  • iNaturalist integration in FloraQuest vote
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Keyed in multiple places:

Click the number at the start of a key lead to highlight both that lead and its corresponding lead. Click again to show only the two highlighted leads. Click a third time to return to the full key with the selected leads still highlighted.

Key to Aizoaceae

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1 Leaves opposite, connate-perfoliate around the stem, triangular in cross-section; fruit a fleshy, indehiscent berry; [subfamily Ruschioideae]
1 Leaves opposite or alternate, sessile or short-petiolate, flattened in cross-section (though often succulent-thickened); fruit either a dry, indehiscent nut or a capsule.
  2 Leaves linear, lanceolate, or oblanceolate, the blade > 3× as long as wide; [subfamily Sesuvioideae]
  2 Leaves orbicular, obovate, or triangular-ovate, the blade < 2.5× as long as wide.
    3 Leaves opposite to subopposite; fruit a circumscissile capsule; [subfamily Sesuvioideae].
      4 Sepals lacking appendages; stamens 1-3 (-5); seeds ca. 150 per capsule
      4 Sepals appendaged; stamens 5-10; seeds 1-12 per capsule
    3 Leaves alternate; fruit either a loculicidal capsule or an indehiscent nut.
        5 Fruit a loculicidal capsule; ovary superior; stems densely covered with white scales; [subfamily Aizooideae]
        5 Fruit an indehiscent nut; ovary inferior; stems green; [subfamily Tetragonioideae]

Key to Sesuvium

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image of plant
Show caption*© Fred Melgert / Carla Hoegen, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Fred Melgert / Carla Hoegen
1 Petiole with lateral flap margins fimbriate; leaves of each opposite pair distinctly unequal in size
image of plant
Show caption*© Alan Cressler: Sesuvium portulacastrum, near Maakole, Hawaii County, Hawaii 1 by Alan Cressler
1 Petiole with lateral flap margins entire; leaves of each opposite pair equal in size (or nearly so).
image of plant
Show caption*© Andrey Zharkikh, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Andrey Zharkikh
  2 Shoots densely covered with bulging bladder cells (crystalline globular papillae), giving plants a grayish cast; plants not rooting at nodes.
    3 Inflorescence bracts 2 (1 pair), each ca. 1 mm long; [rare waif]
image of plant
Show caption*© Andrey Zharkikh, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Andrey Zharkikh
    3 Inflorescence bracts 4-6 (in 2-3 pairs), each bract ca. 5 mm long; [native, s. MS westwards]
image of plant
Show caption*© Alan Cressler: Sesuvium portulacastrum, near Maakole, Hawaii County, Hawaii 1 by Alan Cressler
  2 Shoots smooth, green; plants rooting at nodes or not.
image of plant
Show caption*© Nate Hartley, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Nate Hartley
      4 Flowers and fruits on pedicels (3-) 5-20 mm long; plants perennial, rooting at nodes; styles and locules 5.
image of plant
Show caption*© Keith Bradley
      4 Flowers and fruits sessile (or on pedicels to 1 mm long); plants annual, not rooting at nodes; styles and locules 2-3.
image of plant
Show caption*© Keith Bradley
        5 Seeds smooth, ca. 1 mm long; capsule ovoid, as long as or shorter than the perigone; [widespread in our area]
        5 Seeds wrinkled, ca. 1.5 mm long; capsule tapered, slightly longer than the perigone; [coastal TX (Kenedy County)]