Introduction to the Nyctaginaceae, or Four O-Clock Family

Welcome to the Nyctaginaceae, or four o’clock family, best known for the garden four o’clocks, which look similar to Mirabalis multiflora above, although it is primarily a wildflower species. This family is interesting because it grows in wildly different climates, mostly centered around the neotropics, but it is also often found in arid and semi-arid climates and can be seen as far north as Canada. It also has very unique and interesting fruits, bracts, and stigma shapes, which are all highly variable and important diagnostic features at the tribal and genus level, as you’ll see below.

If you’re new to plant morphology, the guide immediately below is a perfect beginner’s description if you are keen to learn how to identify the Nyctaginaceae, or Four O’Clock, family, with no need to know any scientific jargon.

Below the guide, you’ll find morphology photos to help you identify the features of the Nyctaginaceae family, information on uses and wildlife values, and pictures of individual four o’clock species I have photographed in North America, organized by tribes, so you can start to see the relationships within the family as well.

For researchers or those wanting to learn even more, further down the page is a Scientific Botanical Description with botanical terms and my genus-level distribution data throughout North, Central, and South America.

Beginner’s Guide to the Four O-Clock (Nyctaginaceae) Family

Leaves and Stems of the Four O-Clock Family

The four o’clock family vary in form from trees to woody vines and shrubs and annual and perennial herbs, often with stems that are swollen or jointed at the nodes, sometimes with sticky glands. They are found in a wide range of environmental conditions.

Leaves are mostly in opposite pairs, with one member of the pair often noticeably larger than the other, but sometimes they are alternately arranged or clustered in groups, may or may not have leaf stalks, and lack appendages at the leaf base (stipules). The leaves are simple (never compound), and the blade is entire or somewhat toothed, rarely lobed, and typically has hairs on its surface that are often sticky and trap sand, debris, and bugs on them; needle-like crystals may also be visible in the leaves.

Flowers of the Four O-Clock Family

Four o’clock members mostly have bisexual flowers with both male (stamens) and female (style, stigma, and ovary) organs found in the same flower. Flowers are solitary or aggregated in various inflorescences that are usually subtended by bracts of varying size, shape, color, etc., which is diagnostic at the tribal level.

Flowers range from minute to very large and are mostly regular with radial symmetry, although some bilateral lineages are seen. The flowers are strictly without true petals, having only one whorl of perianth, although it is usually petal-like and functions as petals do. The single whorl is always fused into a tube at the base that persists in the fruit, with usually five tepal lobes.

Reproductive Features of the Four O-Clock Family

There are usually 5 fertile stamens, though there can be more or less and may be infertile in rare lineages with functionally unisexual flowers. Filaments are threadlike and fused only at the very base into a ring. This family is famous for having some of the largest pollen grains among all flowering plants.

Four o’clocks have strictly one superior ovary per flower, attached above the point where the tepals attach, but may be very reduced in rare functionally unisexual flowers. There is one usually terminal style with highly diverse stigmas that are also diagnostic at the tribal level.

Fruits of the Four O-Clock Family

The fruits of the four o’clock family are very unique. They are strictly 1-seeded dry fruits (achene or utricle), but their dispersal unit includes the persistent perianth (tepal tube) that remains, usually fused to the pericarp. The persistent perianth produces unique and highly variable fruits that may be dry, leathery, papery, or covered with sticky prickles; they may have wings or warts or they may be fleshy in woody lineages that use bird dispersal mechanisms.

General Morphology of Nyctaginaceae in North America

Floral, Bract, and Fruit Morphology of Nyctaginaceae in North America

Some Species of Nyctaginaceae Found in North America

Boldoeae Tribe

Salpianthus arenarius—Cats Tongue or gyayabillo (Mexico)

Salpianthus arenarius is a bushy perennial herb or subshrub often growing wider than tall with roughly egg-shaped leaves with pointy tips and covered with short sticky or slightly rough hairs. The flowers are small, greenish-white, and trumpet-shaped with 2-4 long threadlike stamens protruding (visible in the photo). The base of the flower (seen here in purplish-pink) persists as a loose coat around the mature tiny nut-like fruit inside, characteristic of the Boldoeae tribe. This plant is strictly endemic to Mexico, and I found this one at Paco’s Flora y Fauna Reserve in Mazatlan, Sinaloa.

Bougainvilleeae Tribe

Bougainvillea glabra—Lesser Bougainvillea

Lesser bougainvillea is a vigorous scrambling shrub or woody vine that climbs using sharp, curved thorns. Visible are its showy hot pink floral bracts, which are characteristic of the genus and much of the tribe. The true flowers are the creamy yellowish flowers that are visible inside the showy bracts. While strictly native to South America, primarily in Brazil, it is now cultivated in subtropical and tropical regions around the globe and has naturalized in many areas, including southern Mexico. This one was cultivated in Mazatlan, Sinaloa, Mexico, but I have also seen what looked like garden escapees growing there as well.

Nyctagineae Tribe

Abronia angustifolia—Narrow-leaved Sand Verbena

Narrow-leaved Sand Verbena is a curious Nyctaginaceae member that forms sticky leaf annual or short-lived perennial herbaceous mats on open sand, like this one that was growing in the dunes at White Sands National Park in New Mexico, USA. Right beneath the ball-like cluster of slender, fragrant flowers is a cluster of papery or green bracts (involucre) that are not fused together. The narrow, more or less lance-shaped leaves are covered in sticky hairs that make sand grains stick to them. The fruit is a papery, tapered anthocarp with wings suitable for wind dispersal. It is primarily native to the Chihuahuan Desert of the southwestern USA and northern Mexico.

Allionia incarnata—Trailing Windmills

This lovely flower comes from Allionia incarnata, a trailing perennial or warm-season annual herb that spreads across the ground over gravel, roads, and desert crusts. The windmill name comes from the flowers that at first glance look like a single flower with lots of petals but in fact are a tight cluster of 3 separate bilaterally symmetric flowers, each producing a 3-lobed fan-shaped petaloid limb, with the whole psedanthium itself being held in a 3-lobed cup of green bracts. Leaves are in opposite pairs, but one leaf is almost always noticeably larger than the other of the pair. This plant is native throughout the American continents in arid and semi-arid areas from the southwestern USA (where this one was) south to Peru and Argentina.

Commicarpus scandens—Bushy Spiderling

This cute little Nyctaginaceae is Commicarpus scandens, a sprawling perennial herb or vine with slender, pale green to straw-colored, clambering branches with swollen nodes. The pale yellow-green bell flowers are held in loose umbels, and their opposite leaves are heart-shaped to spade-shaped, mostly hairless, with wavy margins and pointy tips. The fruits are club-shaped and topped in large round “warts.” It is native throughout the American continents in arid and semi-arid areas from the southwestern USA south to Peru; this one was at Paco’s Flora Y Fauna Reserve in Mazatlan, Sinaloa, Mexico.

Mirabilis multiflora—Colorado Four O’Clock

Colorado four o’clock is a robust, mounded perennial herb or subshrub from a deep, massive tuberous taproot. It produces showy masses of large magenta trumpet-shaped flowers, with 3-6 flowers held in an involucral cup that bloom one after another. The opposite leaves are somewhat fleshy and thick and often have a waxy bloom. The fruit is a smooth or faintly 10-ribbed anthocarp without wings or glands. It is native to the semiarid interior of the American Southwest and northern Mexico in open scrub, washes, hillsides, and pinyon-juniper woodlands. This one was in open desert scrub near Carrizozo, New Mexico.

Pisonieae Tribe

Pisonia capitata—Mexican devil’s claws

Pisonia capitata is a sprawling, thicket-forming, woody shrub or small tree with clambering branches armed with stout recurved spines that look like cat’s claws. It has tiny flowers densely packed into dense, rounded heads, and it is dioecious, producing separate male and female plants unlike most of the family. The fruits (anthocarps) are 5-angled with prominent stalked glands that secrete very sticky resin that entraps insects, small lizards, and small birds. It is mostly native to northwestern Mexico, with a small disjunct population in southern Arizona. This one was in Paco’s Flora y Fauna Reserve in Mazatlan, Sinaloa, Mexico.

Uses of the Nyctaginaceae Family

While the Nyctaginaceae have no major agricultural uses globally, some do serve as staples or famine foods in some areas. The only semi-domesticated food crop is the mauka (Mirabilis extensa), a root vegetable of minor local importance in the Andes. Also, Boerhavia tuberosa has been consumed as a root vegetable in parts of Peru and Chile.

Numerous species are used horticulturally, however. Some of these species include the garden Four O’Clocks Mirabilis jalapa grown as ornamental plants, and several Bougainvillea (Bougainvillea glabra, B. spectabilis, etc.) and Abronia are also commonly cultivated in warmer regions and are native to South America. 

Mirabilis jalapa is sometimes used as a dye, and Navajo weavers used the dried flowers and roots of Mirabilis multiflora as a source of dye.

Many show gypsophyllia and are used as geo-botanical indicators and for mine reclamation.

Ecosystem and Wildlife Values of the Nyctaginaceae

The woody tribe Pisonieae act as primary ecological engineers in remote oceanic archipelagos and play key roles in nutrient cycling that drive terrestrial food webs and recharge nearshore reefs. Woody lineages sometimes also provide fleshy fruits eaten by birds and bats.

Many Nyctaginaceae members display mutualisms with hawkmoths, providing them with nectar sources while they provide essential pollination services.

Since many thrive in coastal and desert sand dunes, they also provide essential dune stabilization and create essential microhabitats for invertebrates and as nursery sites for more sensitive plant seedlings.

Many Nyctagineae members are restricted to calcium sulfate soils where few other plants can survive. There they act as foundation plants for specialized invertebrate communities, providing nectar, pollen, and foliage in otherwise ‘barren’ lands.

Taxonomy of the Nyctaginaceae Family

There are approximately 390-450 species in 30-33 genera within the Caryophyllales order of the core Eudicot clade. The number of genera varies depending on whether Neea and Neeopsis are included in Guapira, which modern phylogenetics suggests will happen. However, since I have distribution data for those two, and they are still conserved as genera on Plants of the World Online, I am also conserving them here until my sources are in agreement.

Furthermore, the number of species is variable since Guapira and Bpoerhavia contain dozens of unresolved names waiting for a modern revision.

An interesting point to note is that, historically, the Nyctaginaceae were considered primarily herbaceous desert plants that gave rise to a few woody tropical outliers, but molecular phylogenetics has turned that misconception around. Large canopy trees are actually the ancestral condition of the family, which then evolved into woody vines and shrubs before finally exploding into the herbaceous, involucrate, sphingophilous, and gypsophilic desert annuals/perennials (Nyctagineae).

Modern phylogenetic consensus (Douglas & Spellenberg 2010; Caryophyllales Network) recognizes no subfamilies, dividing the family into seven distinct tribes as follows.

Boldoeae Tribe

The Boldoeae is a small, morphologically distinct tribe that is restricted to the Neotropics. It produces small, regular, and typically apetalous flowers represented by a sepaloid or petaloid calyx, an unbranched style, and an ovary with a single basal ovule. The most distinguishing feature is the fruit, where the perianth base persists but is not fused to the fruit, unlike most of the family.

Genera of the Boldoeae Tribe

Boldoa (1), Cryptocarpus (1), Salpianthus (4).

Bougainvilleeae Tribe

The Bougainvilleeae are woody vines or climbing shrubs or spinescent arid-zone shrubs, often armed with axillary thorns or spines. Flowers are in 1-3-flowered dichasia or fascicles, often with showy, persistent, petaloid, membranous, or reticulate bracts that are easily recognizable, but sometimes they are reduced or deciduous. The fruit is a leathery to woody anthicarp, fusiform, 5-ribbed, or may have longitudinal wings. They are primarily native to South America, with a single xerophytic species endemic to southwestern Africa.

Genera of the Bougainvilleeae Tribe

Belemia (2), Bougainvillea (16), Phaeoptilum (1).

Caribeeae Tribe

The Caribeeae is a monospecific single-island endemic tribe of eastern Cuba. It is a compact subshrub or cushion-forming perennial herb with minute, opposite leaves, and solitary sessile flowers that are also minute. Its stipuliform interpetiolar sheath formed by connate leaf bases is unique in the Nyctaginaceae. The fruit is an achene closely enclosed with persistent perianth but without glands, wings, or ribs. It is extremely rare and possibly extinct.

Genera of the Caribeeae Tribe

Caribea (2).

Colignonieae Tribe

The Colignonieae are an early-diverging tribe of subshrubs, scandent or sprawling shrubs, or herbaceous perennials. They have glabrous, puberulent, or glandular stems, and strictly opposite leaves. Flowers are in unbelliform clusters or capitula with small bracts that do not form an involucre. The fruit is an anthocarp with 3-5 prominent longitudinal wings that are scarious, membranous, or chartaceous. They are a montane neotropical family located primarily in cloud forests of the Andes.

Genera of the Colignonieae Tribe

Colignonia (6).

Leucastereae Tribe

The Leucastereae are strictly a South American tribe, primarily endemic to eastern and central Brazil. They are arborescent or robust shrubby plants from small to large trees or multistemmed shrubs, often displaying anomalous secondary growth. Flowers are small to minute, with small inconspicuous bracts and dry anthocarps enclosed by a persistent perianth, longitudinally 5-ribbed, smooth, or brandly winged, and without glands. They are sister to all other Nyctaginaceae, showing that the ancestral Nyctaginaceae were woody and neotropical. Their woody nature has historically had them misclassified in other tribes or even families until it was resolved with molecular phylogenetics.

Genera of the Leucastereae Tribe

Andradea (1), Leucaster (1), Ramisia (1), Reichenbachia (2).

Nyctagineae Tribe

The Nyctagineae are predominantly annual or perennial herbs, suffrutescent perennials, or xerophytic subshrubs, often with starchy tuberous roots, stems with glandular trichomes, and leaves without stipules. Flowers are subtended by various bracts that are diagnostic at the generic level and range from small and deciduous to involucres to enlarged and colorful. Stamens vary from 1 to 30, usually 2 to 6, and the fruit is an anthocarp that is ribbed, sulcate, smooth, or expanded into scarious, hyaline, or papery longitudinal wings and often ornamented with multi-cellular, stipitate, or sessile mucilage-secreting viscously sticky glands that facilitate epizoochory or hydrochory. Many are also gypsophiles. They are a New World tribe, with the greatest diversity in Mexico, but have been introduced as pantropical and subtropical weeds.

Genera of the Nyctagineae Tribe

Abronia (19), Acleisanthes (17), Allionia (2), Anulocaulis (5), Boerhavia (59), Commicarpus (38), Cuscatlania (1), Cyphomeris (2), Mirabilis (56), Nyctaginia (1), Okenia (1), Tripterocalyx (4). 

Pisonieae Tribe

The Pisonieae tribe are mostly woody trees, shrubs, and lianas with stout, recurved, or straight axillary thorns or spines in scandent taxa. Stems frequently exhibit anomalous secondary growth; leaves are variable but always lack stipules. Plants are mostly dioecious or functionally unisexual, with small flowers often with vestigial organs and small scaly bracts that never expand into a showy involucre. Fruits are mostly dry anthocarps with rows of prominent viscously sticky glands or armed with rows of prickly appendages, or they may be smooth and drupaceous. This is a pantropical and subtropical tribe.

Genera of the Pisonieae Tribe

Ceodes (20), Cephalotomandra (2 sometimes as syn. of Pisonia), Grajalesia (1), Guapira (75), Neea (91 sometimes included in Guapira), Neeopsis (1 sometimes included in Guapira), Pisonia (27), Pisoniella (1), Rockia (1).

Key Differences From Similar Families

The Nyctaginaceae are mostly confused with other apetalous Coaryophyllales lineages.

Nyctaginaceae and Phytolaccaceae both share a lack of petals, bearing a single perianth whorl, and produce curved embryos wrapping around central starchy perisperm. However, they can usually be differentiated by Nyctaginaceae’s usually opposite leaves, which are often visibly unequal, with one leaf larger than the other in the opposite pair, compared to Phytolaccaceae’s strictly alternate leaves. Furthermore, Nyctaginaceae have a single carpel in their ovaries, while Phytolaccaceae typically have 5-16 distinct or fused carpels.

The Nyctaginaceae are also confused with the Petiveriaceae, which is its sister family, sharing a solitary carpel, a single basal ovule, and lacking true petals. They can be differentiated by the alternate leaves of Petiveriaceae and their true naked berries rather than dry anthocarps or drupaceous fruits of the Nyctaginaceae. The Petiveriaceae also often emit a strong garlic or sulferous odor when crushed, and they bear small stipular prickles or glands.

The Eriogonoideae subfamily of the Polygonaceae are also sometimes confused since they share small flowers lacking true petals and hard single-seeded achenes, and they are often found in the same arid habitats in western North America. However, the Eriogonoideae have predominantly alternate or basal leaves rather than opposite, swollen nodes with glandular bands or hairs, and flowers with two distinct whorls of 3 instead of one whorl of 5.

Scientific Botanical Description of the Nyctaginaceae Family

Habit & Leaf Form of the Nyctaginaceae Family

The Nyctaginaceae range from trees, lianas, and erect or sprawling shrubs to annual or perennial herbs that may be self-supporting or climbing, often via recurved ancillary thorns or scandent branches. The stems are frequently swollen or articulated at the nodes and are sometimes equipped with viscous, glutinous internodal rings or bands (e.g., Anulocaulis, Boerhavia). They often grow from thickened, tuberous roots or woody taproots. Plants may be mesophytic, xerophytic, or halophytic.

The leaves are usually opposite, with members of the pair often unequal in size, or less often they are alternately arranged or fascicled on short shoots. They are petiolate to sessile, simple, without stipules, and strictly non-sheathing except in Caribea, where opposite petiole bases fuse into a distinctive sipuliform sheath.

The lamina is entire, repand, or sinuate–dentate (rarely lobed), pinnately veined, and cross-venulate except in herbaceous xerophytes, which may be subpalmate, and in fleshy taxa where secondary venuation is obscured.

Hairs are often present and are either eglandular or glandular, mostly multicellular and uniseriate, but complex stellate hairs are also rarely seen. The mesophyll and parenchymatous tissues typically contain calcium oxalate idioblasts bearing raphides (needle-like crystal bundles) and are often accompanied by druses or crystal sand.

Flowers of the Nyctaginaceae Family

The Nyctaginaceae plants are usually hermaphroditic or dioecious/functionally unisexual (bearing vestigial organs), and less often they may be gynodiecious or polygamomonoecious. Pollination is predominantly entomophilous via hawkmoths, bees, flies, wasps, and others. However, some woody neotropical clades are ornithophilous via hummingbirds, and cleistogamous flowers are frequently produced alongside normal chasmogamous flowers in herbaceous Nyctagineae. Less often, anemophily is seen in the reduced flowers of some members of the Pisonieae and Leucastereae.

Flowers are solitary or aggregated in cymes, panicles, thyrsoid corymbs, umbels, dense capitula, or rarely in spikes. Inflorescences are bracteate with varying bract morphology, a key diagnostic feature at the tribal level, from free and inconspicuous to leafy or petaloid and showy, true involucres, and pseudanthial.

Flowers range from minute to very large and showy and are predominately actinomorphic, although zygomorthpic lineages are sometimes seen. A nectariferous annular hypogynous disc often surrounds the ovary base.

The perianth is strictly uniseriate and functionally and visually petaloid, although true petals are absent. It is composed of 5 (3-10) connate tepals, often partitioned into a firm, persistent lower perianth tube that surrounds the ovary and remains to form the outer wall of the anthicarp in all tribes except Boldoeae, and an upper limb that is showy, campanulate, infundibuliform (funnelform), hypocrateriform (salverform), urceolate, or tubular.

Androecium of the Nyctaginaceae Family

Stamens are usually 5 (1–30) and usually all fertile except in dioecious members, where they are reduced to staminodes. They are opposite or alternate with the perianth lobes and arranged in 1 whorl; when numerous, they develop centrifugally. Small tooth-like pseudostaminodes alternate with the fertile stamens in the Colignonieae.

Filaments are filiform, unequal or subequal, ranging from inserted to long-exserted in length and inserted hypogynously on the margin or base of the nectariferous disk, free from or minimally adnate to the base of the perianth tube. They are usually monadelphous, but only at the extreme base are they connate, forming a membranous ring or cup.

Anthers are small, bithecous, globose to oblong, dorsifixed or basifixed, and introrse (or latrorse), dehiscing longitudinally via two lateral, longitudinal slits. The Nyctaginaceae family is famous for having some of the largest pollen among the angiosperms, frequently 70 to 180 micrometers in diameter, with prominent spinulose, echinate, or microreticulate ornamentation.

Gynoecium of the Nyctaginaceae Family

The gynoecium of the Nyctaginaceae is strictly monomerous with a single carpel. The ovary is superior, sessile to short-stipitate, 1-locular (1-celled), typically ellipsoid, ovoid, or fusiform, and is typically surrounded at the base by a fleshy annular or cupular nectariferous hypogynous disc. However, in staminate dioecious flowers, the gynoecium is highly reduced or rarely obsolete.

The style is solitary and usually terminal, filiform to capillary, ranging from included to long-exserted, and is straight, flexuous, or rarely declinate. Stigmas are terminal, dry, and papillate but otherwise exhibit important macroscopic diversity across tribes from capitate, discoid, or peltate in genera like Boerhavia, Mirabilis, Commicarpus, and Leucaster to penicillate, laciniate, or densely fimbriate in Colignonia and certain Pisonieae to linear, clavate, or papillose-thickened in Bougainvillea.

Placentation is strictly basal, with a solitary, erect to ascending, non-arillate ovule. Ovule orientation is campylotropous to amphitropous (rarely hemianatropous or anatropous); bitegmic but occasionally functionally unitegmic. Megasporangium crassinucellate.

Fruit of the Nyctaginaceae Family

The fruits of Nyctanginaceae are unique, with the true ovarian fruit being an indehiscent 1-seeded achene or utricle with a membranous, chartaceous, or crustaceous pericarp. However, the functional dispersal unit is almost always an anthocarp formed by the persistent, accrescent lower portion of the perianth tube that hardens, constricts, and encloses the ripening fruit, in different ways diagnostic at the tribal level. The persistent perianth is mostly adnate to the pericarp, and it is dry, leathery, or woody in most lineages but drupaceous in select lineages of the Pisonieae. The anthocarp itself often exhibits curious dispersal mechanisms, from viscid or glandular prickles to wings or geocarpic via downward-arching pedicels.

Seeds are solitary with a thin, unadorned testa. Nutritional reserves rely on starchy or mealy merisperm with true endosperm highly reduced.

Global Distribution of the Nyctaginaceae Family

The Nyctaginaceae are widely distributed in tropical and subtropical regions of the American continents, with only a few genera natively found outside of the Americas. In the American continents, a few genera are found in the temperate regions of Canada, with increasing diversity southward into the USA, Mexico, and Central and tropical South America, and then decreasing diversity again into temperate southern South America. 

Distribution of the Nyctaginaceae in the American Continents

Canadian Nyctaginaceae Genera

Nyctagineae Tribe in Canada

Abronia 2 spp. of the former W NAM endemic genus native to BC; Mirabilis 4 spp. native to AB, SK, MB, and ON and introduced to BC and QC; Tripterocalyx 1 sp. NAM endemic genus native to AB and SK.

USA Nyctaginaceae Genera

Bougainvilleeae Tribe in the USA

Bougainvillea 1 sp. intro to TX and FL.

Nyctagineae Tribe in the USA

Abronia 19 spp. of former W NAM endemic gemus native to the W USA from ND S to TX and all W, most of which are endemic to the USA; Acleisanthes 12 spp. native to CA, AZ, NM, and TX, inc. 2 endemics, with 1 in the genus endemic to Somalia, Africa, and the rest endemic to SW NAM; Allionia 2 spp. native to CA, NV, AZ, CO, NM, TX, and OK; Anulocaulis 4 spp. S NAM endemic genus native to CA, NV, AZ, NM, and TX, inc. 1 narrow endemic of Death Valley, CA; Boerhavia 19 spp. pantropical genus native to the USA from N CA E to MD but excluding KS, IL, IN, OH, KY, WV, and DE, and inc. 1 narrow endemic of AZ; Commicarpus 1 sp. pantropical genus native to AZ, NM, and TX; Cyphomeris 2 spp. S NAM endemic genus native to NM and TX; Mirabilis 25 spp. native to all of the USA, except FL and HI, where intro; Nyctaginia monospecific S NAM endemic genus native to NM and TX; Okenia monospecific N+C Americas endemic genus native to FL; Tripterocalyx 4 spp. of NAM endemic genus native to CA, NV, UT, AZ, NM, TX, CO, WY, MT, ND, AD, NE, and KS, inc. 2 endemics.   

Pisonieae Tribe in the USA

Guapira 3 spp. Americas genus native to FL; Pisonia 9 spp. pantropical genus native to AZ, TX, and FL, and intro and native HI; Rockia monospecific endemic genus native to HI.

Mexico Nyctaginaceae Genera

Boldoeae Tribe in Mexico

Boldoa monospecific neoendemic genus native to the Pacific and central Mexico; Cryptocarpus monospecific neoendemic genus with disjunct distribution in SW Mexico and SAM; Salpianthus 4 spp. Mexican endemic genus (unless Boldoa is included) native throughout all of Mexico.

Bougainvilleeae Tribe in Mexico

Bougainvillea 1 sp. intro to SE Mexico, appears introduced in Sinaloa, and widely cultivated elsewhere.

Nyctagineae Tribe in Mexico

Abronia ~ 3 spp. of the former W NAM endemic genus native to N+SW Mexico; Acleisanthes 14 spp. native to N Mexico S to Jal, with most diversity in NE Mexico, including 4+ endemics, with 1 sp. in the genus endemic to Somalia, Africa, with the rest in SW NAM; Allionia 2 spp. native to most of Mexico except the SE; Anulocaulis 4 spp. S NAM endemic genus native to NE Mexico, inc. 1 endemic of Coa; Boerhavia ~ 12 spp. pantropical genus native to all of Mexico, inc. 1-3 endemics; Commicarpus 4 spp. pantropical genus native to all of Mexico, inc. 3 narrow endemics of Mexico; Cyphomeris 2 spp. S NAM endemic genus native to much of Mexico except the SE; Mirabilis 31 spp. native to all of Mexico, inc. 14 endemics; Nyctaginia monospecific S NAM endemic genus native to NE Mexico; Okenia monospecific N+C Americas endemic genus native to all of Mexico; Tripterocalyx 1 sp. of NAM endemic genus native to NE Mexico.  

Pisonieae Tribe in Mexico

Grajalesia monospecific endemic genus of S Mexico and N CAM; Guapira 3 spp. Americas genus native to all of Mexico; Neea 3-4 spp. Americas genus native to all of Mexico, inc. 1 endemic; Pisonia 6 spp. pantropical genus native to all of Mexico, inc. 2 endemic; Pisoniella 1 sp. native to NE+SW+C+Gulf Mexico, with disjunct ditribution in Bolivia and NW Argentina.

Neotropical Nyctaginaceae Genera

Boldoeae Tribe in the Neotropics

Boldoa monospecific neoendemic genus native to CAM, Mexico, Cuba, and Venezuela; Cryptocarpus monospecific neoendemic genus with disjunct distribution in SW Mexico, Ecuador, the Galápagos, Peru, and Bolivia; Salpianthus 1 sp. Americas endemic genus native to Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Cuba, Colombia, Venezuela, and Ecuador, and the rest of the genus endemic to Mexico.

Bougainvilleeae Tribe in the Neotropics

Belemia 2 spp. narrow endemic genus of N+SE Brazil; Bougainvillea 16 spp. former SAM endemic genus native to Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Paraguay, Argentina, and C+E+S Brazil, and intro to N Brazil, Venezuela, Nicaragua, the Antilles, Trinidad-Tobago, Juan Fernandez Is., the Bahamas, and elsewhere.

Caribeeae Tribe in the Neotropics

Caribea monospecific single-island endemic genus/tribe of E. Cuba.

Colignonieae Tribe in the Neotropics

Colignonia 6 spp. Andes-endemic genus native to Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Paraguay, and NW Argentina.

Leucastereae Tribe in the Neotropics

Andradea monospecific narrow endemic genus of E Brazil; Leucaster monospecific narrow endemic genus of SE Brazil; Ramisia monospecific narrow endemic genus of E Brazil; Reichenbachia 2 spp. SAM endemic genus native to Colombia, Peru, Bolivia, C Brazil, Paraguay, and NE Argentina.

Nyctagineae Tribe in the Neotropics

Allionia 2 spp. native to Guatemala, Cuba, Hispaniola, the Venezuelan Antilles, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, N Chile, Argentina, and Uruguay; Boerhavia 20 spp. pantropical genus native to CAM, Bahamas, all Antilles, Trinidad-Tobago, the Galapagos, and tropical SAM S to C Chile and N Argentina except in N Brazil where it is intro, and also intro in Bermuda; Commicarpus 2 spp. pantropical genus native to Guatemala, Bahamas, Turks-Caicos Is., the Greater Antilles, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia, inc. 1 W SAM + Galapagos endemic; Cuscatlania monospecific N CAM endemic genus of Honduras and El Salvador; Mirabilis 6 spp. native to CAM (exc. Panama, inc. 1 endemic to Guatemala), Colombia, Ecuador, Peru (1 endemic), Bolivia, N+C Chile, Argentina, intro Bahamas, Galapagos, Juan Fernandez Island, the Antilles (exc. the Netherland Antilles), Trinidad-Tobago, Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana, Brazil, Paraguay, and Uruguay; Okenia monospecific N+C Americas endemic genus native to Honduras and Nicaragua.

Pisonieae Tribe in the Neotropics

Cephalotomandra 2 spp. narrow N neoendemic genus of Panama (1 endemic) and Colombia (1 endemic); Grajalesia monospecific endemic genus of S Mexico and N CAM; Guapira 65+ spp. Americas genus native to the Bahamas, Turks-Cacicos, the Antilles, Trinidad-Tobago, Mexico, CAM, and tropical SAM S to Bolivia, Paraguay, and S Brazil; Neea ~75 spp. Americas genus native and mostly endemic to CAM, the Greater Antilles, the Venezuelan Antilles, the Leeward Is., and tropical SAM S to Bolivia, Paraguay, and S Brazil; Neeopsis monospecific narrow endemic genus of Guatemala; Pisonia ~12-15 spp. pantropical genus native to CAM, the Bahamas, the Antilles (exc. Netherland Antilles), Colombia, Venezuela, Guayana, Brazil, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, N Argentina, and Paraguay; Pisoniella 1 sp. native to Bolivia and NW Argentina, with disjunct distribution in Mexico.

Patagonian South America Nyctaginaceae Genera

Bougainvilleeae Tribe in Patagonian South America

Bougainvillea 1 sp. former SAM endemic genus native to S Argentina.

Nyctagineae Tribe in Patagonian South America

Allionia 1 sp. native to S Argentina; Mirabilis 1 sp. possibly native to the northern limit of the region in S Argentina.  

Additional Information and References

• Visit Lyrae’s Dictionary of Botanical Terms to learn the terminology of botanists. Note that if you hover over most of the words in the articles, you can also get definitions from them there.
• Willis, Lyrae (Unpublished). Plant Families of North America. This is where all of the family descriptions come from. Below should be most of my references for this, along with my own personal observations throughout North America.
• Canadensys: Acadia University, Université de Montréal Biodiversity Centre, University of Toronto Mississauga, University of British Columbia. http://data.canadensys.net/explorer (accessed 2020 – current)
• Caryophyllales Network. (2015+). Caryophyllales.org: A dynamic synthesis of the order Caryophyllales. Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin (BGBM). Available at: https://caryophyllales.org/cdm_dataportal/taxon/7040cc71-4f0d-4fd9-9384-eb4d003274aa
• Douglas, N. A., & Spellenberg, R. W. (2010). A new tribal classification of Nyctaginaceae. Taxon, 59(3), 905–910. https://doi.org/10.1002/tax.593018
• FNA 1993+. Flora of North America. https://floranorthamerica.org/Main_Page. Accessed 2022-current.
• Hernández-Ledesma, P., & Flores-Olvera, H. (2021). Nyctaginaceae. In: Flora del Bajío y de Regiones Adyacentes, Fascículo 223, 1–118. Instituto de Ecología, A.C., Pátzcuaro, Michoacán.
• iNaturalist.org 2020+. https://www.inaturalist.org/. Accessed 2020-current. If you like plants or nature in general, please join the iNaturalist community and start sharing your observations with others. The data we track is invaluable for scientists like me wanting to track population changes over time.
• Neotropikey: Milliken, W., Klitgård, B., & Baracat, A. eds. 2009+. Neotropikey: Interactive key and information resources for flowering plants of the Neotropics. www.kew.org/neotropikey.com (accessed 2020 – current).
• Patagonia Wildflowers: Wildflower Identification Site. https://patagoniawildflowers.org/ Accessed throughout the fall of 2020.
• POWO 2019+. Plants of the World Online. Facilitated by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Published on the Internet: http://www.plantsoftheworldonline.org/. Accessed 2020-current.
• Stevens, P. F. 2001+. Angiosperm Phylogeny Website. Version 14, July 2017 [more or less continuously updated since]. http://www.mobot.org/MOBOT/research/APweb/
• USDA, NRCS. 2020+. The PLANTS Database (http://plants.usda.gov, 2 June 2020). National Plant Data Team, Greensboro, NC, USA; accessed 2020-present.
• WFO (2022+): World Flora Online. Published on the Internet: http://www.worldfloraonline.org. Accessed Spring 2022 – current

Copyright Information

The information and the photos on this site are free to use for educational purposes, with proper attribution. For other uses, please contact me first.

You can cite this site as Willis, Lyrae (2020+). Lyrae’s Nature Blog – Plant Families of North America. https://lyraenatureblog.com/