Bruniaceae

Brunia Family

Shrubs, subshrubs or small trees, often heath-like. Leaves alternate and overlapping, small, simple, mostly incurved; stipules absent or minute. Flower clusters axillary or in terminal daisy-like heads, occasionally in spikes or open clusters. Flowers bisexual, regular, 5-parted, calyx with 5 lobes. Petals free or united at the base into a tube, white or pink to lilac or red. Ovary superior to inferior, with 1-3 chambers, each containing 1-12 pendulous ovules; styles 1-3, free or united. Fruit dry, capsular or achene-like, mostly with 1-2 seeds.

A small family with listed members but used primarily as cut flowers for floristry.

Berzelia lanuginosa (L.) Brongn., Button Flower, from S Africa is popular with florists; it is very similar to the above, growing to 2 m tall, with overlapping needle leaves to 1 cm long, but with slightly smaller, creamy white flower heads in stalked clusters, and with an ovary of 1 style and 1 chamber containing 1 ovule.

11 genera with about 69 species from S Africa, mainly on the Cape.

Semi-hardwood cuttings or seed.

Heath-like plants with needle leaves and generally dense flower heads.

Source: Spencer, R. (2002). Bruniaceae. In: Spencer, R.. Horticultural Flora of South-eastern Australia. Volume 3. Flowering plants. Dicotyledons. Part 2. The identification of garden and cultivated plants. University of New South Wales Press.

Hero image
kingdom Plantae
phylum   Tracheophyta
class    Magnoliopsida
superorder     Asteranae
order      Bruniales
Higher taxa
Subordinate taxa
genus        Brunia Lam.