Latin calceolus — slipper, referring to the shape of the lower lip of the flower.
Herbs and shrubs. Leaves mostly opposite, sometimes whorled, basal or along the stem, simple or pinnate, mostly rough and hairy, leaf stalk often winged. Flowers in irregular clusters, mostly yellow, purple or spotted. Calyx of 4 segments. Corolla 2-lipped with a massive, hanging, inflated, slipper-like, pouched lower lip and smaller upper lip. Stamens 2 (3). Fruit a capsule.
Popular as florists' flowers and indoor pot plants. Generally grown as members of the C. Herbeohybrida Group, a complex hybrid group thought to include the species C. cana, C. corymbosa and C. crenatifolia. Plants derived from this group are treated as biennials used for bedding or as pot plants.
[C. _herbeohybrida Voss, C. _hybrida Forbes].
C. Fruticohybrida Group is derived mostly from C. integrifolia, a shrub to 1 m or so tall with generally smaller flowers than the Herbeohybrida Group.
Seed, cuttings or division.
A few species have medicinal uses.
Balloon-like lower lip to the flower.
About 300 species of tropical and southern America.
Molau (1988).
Source: (2002). Scrophulariaceae. In: . Horticultural Flora of South-eastern Australia. Volume 4. Flowering plants. Dicotyledons. Part 3. The identification of garden and cultivated plants. University of New South Wales Press.
