| Dicotyledon | Literature for Physalis peruviana
Lorence & Wagner, 2020. |
| Solanaceae -- The Nightshade Family | Bibliography |
| Physalis peruviana | |
Common name(s): ground cherry, husk tomato, Cape gooseberry, pa`ina (Hawai`i), poha |
| General Information | ||
|---|---|---|
| Distribution | Native to Peru, widely cultivated and naturalized in warm temperate areas.In the Hawaiian Islands, naturalized on Kaua`i, O`ahu, Moloka`i, Lana`i, Maui, Hawai`i. | |
| Habit |
Soft wooded, short-lived shrubs to ca. 1 m tall, straggly with age; all parts densely pubescent with erect, simple or glandular hairs to 1 mm long. |
|
| Leaves |
Leaves simple, alternate, usually geminate, 1 larger than the other, petiolate; blade ovate-acuminate, often 6 cm long, 4 cm wide, margin entire or rarely with a few blunt lobes, apex acuminate, base cordate; petiole 2‒3 cm long. |
|
| Flowers |
Inflorescences a solitary flower in the leaf axil. Flowers pedicellate; calyx connate in proximal ½, 5-lobed, veins often prominent, lobes acuminate triangular, ca. 1 cm long, distinct at apex; corolla pale yellow with well-defined purplish-brown spots at base, 15‒20 mm in diameter, limb rotate or shallowly 10-lobed, tube swollen into shallow nectary pouches between the filaments, densely pubescent with pale yellowish dendritic hairs below the spots and around the nectaries; style 5‒7 mm long. |
|
| Fruit |
Fruit pale yellow, drying pale brown, aromatic, succulent, globose, 1.5‒2 cm in diameter, enclosed in the inflated calyx, 3‒3.5 cm long. |
|
| Seeds |
Seeds numerous, pale brown, discoid, 1.75‒2 mm long, minutely shallowly reticulate, embryo curved, endosperm present. |
|
| Chromosomes |
2n = 24, 48, 72. |
|
| Notes |
Self compatible. |
|
| Contributor |
Nancy Khan |
