Mesembryanthemaceae
| Aizoaceae | |
|---|---|
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| Sesuvium portulacastrum | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| Clade: | Angiosperms |
| Clade: | Eudicots |
| Order: | Caryophyllales |
| Family: |
Aizoaceae Martinov |
| Genera | |
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Aizoaceae or Ficoidaceae (the fig-marigold family or ice plant family) is a family of dicotyledonous flowering plants containing 135 genera and about 1900 species. They are commonly known as stone plants, carpet weeds or vygies. Species that resemble stones or pebbles are sometimes called mesembs. Several species are known as ice plants because "they have bladder-like hairs on the leaf surface that reflect and refract light in a manner to make it appear that they sparkle like ice crystals."
The family is widely recognised by taxonomists, although once it went by the botanical name "Ficoideae", now disallowed. The APG II system of 2003 (unchanged from the APG system of 1998) also recognises the family, and assigns it to the order Caryophyllales in the clade core eudicots. The APG II system also classes the former families Mesembryanthemaceae Fenzl, Sesuviaceae Horan. and Tetragoniaceae Link under the family Aizoaceae.
Most species (96%, 1782 species in 132 genera) in this family are endemic to arid or semiarid parts of southern Africa, but a few are from Australia and the Central Pacific. Most of these species are succulents and belong to the subfamilies Mesembryanthemoideae and Ruschioideae and are loosely termed mesems or mesembs.
A few species (especially Carpobrotus edulis, commonly called ice plant) have been widely introduced and become invasive.
Most fig-marigolds are herbaceous, rarely somewhat woody, with stems growing either erect or prostrate. Leaves are simple, opposite or alternate, and more or less succulent with entire (or rarely toothed) margins. Flowers are perfect in most species (but unisexual in some), actinomorphic, and appear singularly or in few-flowered cymes developing from the leaf axils. Sepals are typically five (3-8) and more or less connate (fused) below. True petals are absent. However, some species have numerous linear petals derived from staminodes. The fruit is a capsule with one to numerous seeds per cell.
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