Cryptantha is a genus of flowering plants in the borage family, Boraginaceae. They are known commonly as cat's eyes and popcorn flowers (the latter name is also used to refer to the closely related genus Plagiobothrys,[1] and members of the subtribe of Amsinckiinae).[2] They are distributed throughout western North America and western South America, but they are absent from the regions in between.[1]

Cryptantha
Cryptantha muricata
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Asterids
Order: Boraginales
Family: Boraginaceae
Subfamily: Boraginoideae
Genus: Cryptantha
Lehm. ex G.Don
Type species
Cryptantha glomerata
Species

about 200, see text.

These are annual or perennial herbs usually coated in rough hairs and bearing rounded flower corollas that are almost always white, but are yellow in a few species.[1] Several morphological characters are used to distinguish species from one another, but the most definitive is the form of the nutlet, which varies in shape, size, color, and pattern of attachment.[1]

Species edit

The genus has been reorganized several times. As of March 2024, Plants of the World Online accepts about 110 species:[3]

 
Cryptantha fendleri
 
Cryptantha pterocarya
 
Cryptantha scoparia
 
Cryptantha clevelandii
 
Cryptantha utahensis

Formerly placed here edit

Many Cryptantha species have been transferred to other genera:[5]

References edit

  1. ^ a b c d Hasenstab-Lehman, K. E. and M. G. Simpson. (2012). Cat's eyes and popcorn flowers: phylogenetic systematics of the genus Cryptantha s. l. (Boraginaceae). Systematic Botany 37(3), 738-57.
  2. ^ "Amsinckiinae". www.sci.sdsu.edu. Retrieved 2 July 2022.
  3. ^ "Cryptantha Lehm. ex G.Don | Plants of the World Online | Kew Science". Plants of the World Online. Retrieved 2024-03-19.
  4. ^ WTU Herbarium
  5. ^ Simpson, M. G. and the Plant Systematics Lab, SDSU. Cryptantha s.l. Taxonomy & Images. Based upon Hasenstab-Lehman, K. E. and M. G. Simpson. (2012).

External links edit