BALSAMINACEAE
Annual or perennial herbs. Stem erect or procumbent, usually succulent and swollen at nodes. Leaves simple, exstipulate, sometimes stipular glands at base of petiole, alternate, opposite or whorled, margin serrate to nearly entire, teeth often glandular-mucronate, pinnately veined. Inflorescence axillary or subterminal racemes, pseudoumbels or flowers solitary. Flowers bisexual, zygomorphic, often showy. Sepals 3(-5); lateral sepals free or connate, the lowermost large and spurred. Petals 5, free, upper petal (STANDARD) flat or cucullate, small or large, often crested abaxially, lateral petals free or united in pairs (WINGS). Stamens 5, alternating with petals, connate or nearly so into a ring surrounding ovary and stigma; filaments short, flat with a scale-like appendage inside; anthers 2 bithecous, connivent, opening by a slit or pore. Carpels 4-5, syncarpous, ovary superior, 4-5-locular, each with 2- many anatropous ovules; style 1, very short or absent; stigmas 1-5. Fruit an indehiscent berry or a 4-5-valved loculicidal fleshy capsule, usually dehiscing elastically. Seeds dispersed explosively from opening valves, endosperm absent.
2 genera and 1119 species
