BOTANY WITH BASICS OF HYDROBOTANY (AQUATIC PLANTS OF UKRAINE) - B.Ye. Yakubenko - 2011

X. SEED PLANTS

Order Scrophulariales

Herbs and subshrubs, less commonly shrubs and trees, sometimes lianas. Leaves alternate or opposite, sometimes whorled, simple or compound, typically without stipules. Flowers arranged in cymose or racemose inflorescences, occasionally solitary. Flowers are generally zygomorphic, bisexual, less frequently unisexual. Perianth five-merous, rarely four-merous. Sepals more or less connate. Corolla sympetalous, often bilabiate, sometimes actinomorphic. Stamens are adnate by their filaments to the corolla tube and alternate with its lobes. In four-merous flowers, the number of stamens equals the number of lobes, or is reduced to two. In five-merous flowers, there are usually only four fertile stamens, while the upper (adaxial) one is either sterile or absent; sometimes only two stamens are fertile, with the rest being sterile or entirely missing. Gynoecium typically consists of two median carpels (rarely three or four) with a terminal style bearing two stigmas. Ovary superior, less frequently semi-inferior or inferior, with one, two, or usually numerous ovules in each locule. Fruits are capsules, sometimes indehiscent, drupaceous, or baccate, occasionally breaking apart into nutlet-like mericarps.

The order comprises 17 families, 834 genera, and approximately 12,000 species, whose representatives are distributed primarily in the tropics and subtropics of both hemispheres. In Ukraine, it is represented by 4 families, 32 genera, and 211 species, of which Scrophulariaceae is the largest family.