Description: Annual short-lived herbs, sometimes perennial and shrubby; indumentum of short-stalked T-shaped hairs.
Leaves simple, alternate, shortly petiolate.
Flowers pedunculate in terminal cymose panicles; involucral bracts herbaceous, in 3–4 rows, sometimes 5 rows, purplish on margins and apices. Florets bisexual, actinomorphic, tubular, 15–95 per head; receptacle flat, with scales.; corolla 5 lobed; anthers sagittate below, without tails or appendages, non-glandular; style with node below subulate branches.
Achenes ovoid-terete, mostly 5-ribbed, hairy or glabrous.
Distribution and occurrence: A genus fo 7 or 8 species, distributed in the Indian Ocean, SE and eastern Asia, amd tropical Africa; 2 species naturalised in Australia. 1 species in NSW.
Text by Louisa Murray (Nov 2018)
Taxon concept: Flora of Australia Vol 37: 1 p183
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