7558.000 Limosella L.

Marsh or aquatic, perennial herbs, glabrous, tufted, creeping or floating. Plants stemless or with slender stolon-like stems rooting at the nodes. Leaves petiolate, usually basal, sometimes fasciculate at the nodes, rarely alternate, erect or floating; lamina linear, spathulate or oblong-ovate. Flowers solitary, axillary, borne on peduncles which are usually shorter than the leaves, and are often deflexed in fruit. Calyx (4-)5-lobed. Corolla: limb 5-lobed, spreading; lobes subequal. Stamens 4, didynamous. Ovary 2-locular; ovules many. Fruit a 2-valved, ovoid or spherical capsule, almost indehiscent.

Worldwide: c. 11 species, mainly in temperate and cooler regions but also on tropical mountains

Zimbabwe: 2 taxa.