Butterfly Flower

Description

Schizanthus also called butterfly flower, fringeflower, poor-man's-orchid, is a genus of plants in the Solanaceae (nightshade) family. They are annual or biennial herbaceous plants, with attractive flowers and they belong to the Schizanthoideae subfamily of the solanaceae. The genus includes species native to Chile and Argentina, many species are adventitious in other parts of the world such as New Zealand and the United States. Annual or biennial, glandulous-pubescent herbaceous plants, with alternate, pinnatilobate or bipinnatisect leaves and attractive flowers, arranged at the end of stems. The flowers are zygomorphic and hermaphrodite. The calyx has 5 parts, with linear or spatulate segments. The corolla is bilabiate; the superior labia is tripartite, with the central lobe complete and notched and the two laterals bifid. The inferior labia is tripartite with the central lobe notched, almond-shaped and the laterals are complete. The androecium is formed of 4(5) didynamous stamens, the two or three inferior stamens are reduced to staminodes. The fruit is a pluriseminate boll, dehiscent by two bifid valves. The basic chromosome number is x=10.