Description: Annual herbs.
Leaves opposite below, narrow, margins entire, subsessile.
Flowers in terminal bracteate racemes. Sepals unequal, longer than corolla tube. Corolla 2-lipped; tube swollen at base into a pouch on the lower side; upper lip 2-lobed, lower lip 3-lobed, with a prominent palate at base closing the mouth. Stamens 4, didynamous. Stigma capitate.
Capsule with 2 unequal loculi, the narrower upper loculus opening by a single apical pore, the lower by 2 pores; seeds many, flat but thick, with one face smooth, narrowly winged, the other with a thick undulate minutely papillose rim, surrounding a hollow sometimes with a central ridge or row of a few tubercles.
Distribution and occurrence: World: 3 species, Mediterranean region. Australia: 1 species (naturalized).
Antirrhinum, the commonly cultivated snapdragons, differs by its perennial habit, ± equal sepals, and wrinkled-reticulate seeds.
Text by W. R. Barker
Taxon concept:
| One species in NSW: Misopates orontium |
|
