View source for Catharanthus

{{Treatment/ID
|accepted_name=Catharanthus
|accepted_authority=G. Don
|publications={{Treatment/Publication
|title=Gen. Hist.
|place=4: 71, 95. 1837
|year=1837
}}
|common_names=Periwinkle
|special_status={{Treatment/ID/Special_status
|code=I
|label=Introduced
}}
|basionyms=
|synonyms=
|hierarchy=Apocynaceae;Catharanthus
|hierarchy_nav=<div class="higher-taxa"><div class="higher-taxon"><small>family</small>[[Apocynaceae]]</div><div class="higher-taxon"><small>genus</small>[[Catharanthus]]</div></div>
|etymology=Greek katharos, pure, and anthos, flower, alluding to neatness and beauty of flowers
|volume=Volume 14
|mention_page=
|treatment_page=
}}<!--

--><span class="statement" id="st-undefined" data-properties=""><b>Subshrubs </b>or herbs, perennial [annual]; latex milky. <b>Stems</b> erect, ascending, or decumbent, unarmed, glabrous or eglandular-pubescent. <b>Leaves</b> deciduous, opposite or occasionally subopposite, petiolate; stipular colleters interpetiolar and intrapetiolar; laminar colleters absent. <b>Inflorescences</b> axillary, solitary flowers or pairs of flowers, short-pedunculate or sessile. <b>Flowers</b>: calycine colleters absent; corolla white, pink, red, magenta, or red-violet, salverform, aestivation sinistrorse; corolline corona absent; androecium and gynoecium not united into a gynostegium; stamens inserted at top [middle] of corolla tube; anthers connivent, not adherent to stigma, connectives not appendiculate or enlarged, locules 4; pollen free, not massed into pollinia, translators absent; nectaries 2, elongate and often exceeding ovary. <b>Fruits</b> follicles, solitary or paired, erect, green, slender and weakly moniliform, terete or compressed, surface striate, pubescent. <b>Seeds</b> ovoid [oblong], flattened, not winged, not beaked, not comose, not arillate. <b>x</b> = 8.</span><!--

-->{{Treatment/Body
|distribution=Asia (India);Indian Ocean Islands (Madagascar;Sri Lanka);introduced also nearly worldwide in tropical and subtropical regions.
|introduced=true
|discussion=<p>Species 8 (1 in the flora).</p><!--
--><p>At various times the generic names Vinca, Lochnera Reichenbach, and Catharanthus have been used for the species treated here, but W. T. Stearn (1966) argued convincingly that the latter name is the legitimate one for the genus. While Catharanthus and Vinca have been shown to be somewhat closely related (A. O. Simões et al. 2016), they have disjunct native geographic ranges (India, Madagascar, and Sri Lanka for Catharanthus, Europe and western Asia for Vinca) and are easily distinguished by the characteristics given in the generic key.</p>
|tables=
|references=
}}<!--

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-->{{#Taxon:
name=Catharanthus
|author=David E. Lemke
|authority=G. Don
|rank=genus
|parent rank=family
|synonyms=
|basionyms=
|family=Apocynaceae
|distribution=Asia (India);Indian Ocean Islands (Madagascar;Sri Lanka);introduced also nearly worldwide in tropical and subtropical regions.
|introduced=true
|reference=None
|publication title=Gen. Hist.
|publication year=1837
|special status=Introduced
|source xml=
|genus=Catharanthus
}}<!--

-->[[Category:Treatment]][[Category:Apocynaceae]]