Angiosperms (Flowering Plants) • Earth.com

Shrubby St. Johnswort

(Hypericum prolificum)

galery
en

Description

Hypericum foliosum is a species of flowering plant in the St. John's wort family Hypericaceae, section Androsaemum. It is endemic to the Azores. Hypericum foliosum is present in all of the Azorean islands, and can be found in damp shaded places in the mountains from 200 to 900 m (660 to 2,950 ft) above sea level. Hypericum foliosum is a shrub that grows to be 50–100 cm (20–39 in) tall. Its inflorescence is golden yellow and has 12-18 petals. It has 20-30 stamens grouped into several stamen fascicles. Hypericum is a genus of flowering plants in the family Hypericaceae (formerly considered a subfamily of Clusiaceae). The genus has a nearly worldwide distribution, missing only from tropical lowlands, deserts and polar regions. Many Hypericum species are regarded as invasive species and noxious weeds. All members of the genus may be referred to as St. John's wort, and some are known as goatweed. The white or pink flowered marsh St. John's worts of North American and eastern Asia are generally accepted as belonging to the separate genus Triadenum. Hypericum is unusual for a genus of its size because a worldwide taxonomic monograph was produced for it by Norman Robson (working at the Natural History Museum, London). Robson recognizes 36 sections within Hypericum. Hypericum species are quite variable in habit, occurring as trees, shrubs, annuals, and perennials. Trees in the sense of single stemmed woody plants are rare, as most woody species have multiple stems arising from a single base. Shrubs have erect or spreading stems but never root from nodes that touch the ground. However, perennial herbs tend to root from these horizontal nodes, especially those that occur in wet habitats. Annual herbs tend to have taproots with a developed system of secondary hair roots. Many species of Hypericum are completely glabrous, others have simple uniseriate hairs, and some species have long, fine hairs.

Taxonomic tree:

Domain:
Kingdom: Plantae
Phylum: Magnoliophyta
Class: Magnoliopsida
Order:Malpighiales
Family:Hypericaceae
Genus:Hypericum
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