Eruca

Annuals; not scapose; glabrous, hirsute, or hispid, (trichomes often retrorse). Stems erect, branched [unbranched]. Leaves basal and cauline; petiolate or sessile; basal rosulate or not, petiolate, blade margins usually lyrate-pinnatifid or pinnatipartite, rarely bipinnatisect or undivided; cauline shortly petiolate or sessile, blade (base not auriculate), margins entire, dentate, or pinnatifid. Racemes (corymbose), greatly elongated in fruit. Fruiting pedicels erect to ascending, stout. Flowers: sepals (sometimes persistent), erect, oblong [linear], (connivent), lateral pair saccate basally; petals cream or yellow (with dark brown or purple veins), broadly obovate, claw differentiated from blade (± equal to sepals, apex obtuse or emarginate); stamens strongly tetradynamous; filaments not dilated basally; anthers oblong or linear, (base sagittate, apex obtuse); nectar glands (4), distinct, median pair present. Fruits siliques, dehiscent, sessile, segments 2, linear or oblong [elliptic], not torulose, terete or slightly 4-angled; (terminal segment indehiscent, flattened and ensiform, seedless); valves each with prominent midvein, (coriaceous), glabrous, hirsute, or hispid; replum rounded; septum complete, (membranous); ovules 10-50 per ovary; (style obsolete); stigma conical, 2-lobed (lobes connivent, decurrent). Seeds biseriate, plump, not winged, [sub]globose or ovoid; seed coat (minutely reticulate), mucilaginous when wetted; cotyledons conduplicate. x = 11.

Sep erect, the inner somewhat saccate at base; pet spatulate, the blade tapering gradually to the long slender claw, staminal glands minute; ovary cylindric, gradually tapering into the elongate style; ovules numerous; stigma minute; fr slightly flattened, several-seeded, tipped with a prominent flat beak; valves conspicuously 1-nerved; seeds in 2 rows in each locule; herbs with branched stems and large, mostly pinnately or lyrately lobed lvs; pubescence sparse, of simple hairs. 4, Mediterranean and e. Afr.

Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

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