Fam. 38. Cannaceae Juss. Canna Family 



Perennial erect herbs with branched or unbranched stems and large alternate 

 leaves with sheathing petioles; flowers perfect, zygomorphic, mostly showy, borne 

 in terminal thyrsoid panicles; sepals 3, erect, greenish and bractlike; petals 3, 

 more or less united to form a tube; stamens more or less adnate to the corolla, 

 with one filament anther-bearing, the others becoming showy staminodia; ovary 

 inferior, 3-celled, with the placentae parietal; style petaloid, the stigma marginal. 



A solitary genus of about 55 species, mostly in tropical America. 



1. Canna L. Canna. Indian-shot 



Characters of the family. 



1. Flowers red; plant not glaucous; leaves rounded at base 1. C. indica. 



1. Flowers yellow; leaves tapered at base (2) 



2(1). Petals becoming reflexed; tube about 5 cm. long, prominent; plant green; 

 leaves oblong-lanceolate 2. C flaccida. 



2. Petals remaining erect or strongly ascending; tube about 2 cm. long; plant 



glaucous; leaves narrowly lanceolate 3. C. glauca. 



1. Canna indica L. Indian-shot 



Plant slender, to about 12 dm. tall, the herbage deep-green and glabrous; leaves 

 oblong-elliptic, 2-4 dm. long, to about 2 dm. wide; flowers small, usually in pairs, 

 red or reddish, not especially showy; floral bracts suborbicular; sepals 1-1.5 cm. 

 long, exceeding the perianth tube; corolla lobes 3-3.5 cm. long, much longer than 

 the tube; staminodia linear to narrowly spatulate or oblanceolate, flat, about 5 cm. 

 long; capsule 25-35 mm. long. 



Commonly cult, and escaped to low wet grounds along the Gulf Coastal Plain 

 from Fla. to Tex., summer-fall; nat. of E. I. j 



2. Canna flaccida Salisb. Fig. 349. 



Plant to 75 cm. high, the herbage green throughout; leaves oblong-lanceolate, 

 to 6 dm. long and 13 cm. wide; raceme simple, loose and few-flowered, with very 

 small bracts, erect; flowers yellow, showy, soft or flaccid in texture; sepals about 

 25 mm. long; corolla tube about 5 cm. long; petals yellow, strongly reflexed, 

 nearly as long as the tube; upper staminodia 3, rounded, 5-7.5 cm. long, the lipj 

 orbicular. 



About lakes and in marshes and swamps along the coast in s. Tex., Apr.-June;1 

 from S. C. to Fla. and Tex. 



3. Canna glauca L. 



Plant to 9 dm. high, the herbage green and glaucous; leaves narrowly lanceo- 

 late, to at least 6 dm. long and usually 1 dm. or less wide, tapering both to the ' 

 base and to the long-acuminate apex, typically white hyaline-edged; raceme rather 

 loose, erect, simple or forked, little-exceeding the leaves; floral bracts orbicular; 

 flowers clear-yellow, narrow and erect; sepals green, about 12 mm. long; petals 

 4-5 cm. long, the tube about 2 cm. long; upper staminodia 3, entire, to 75 mm. 

 long and 2 cm. broad; lip narrow, emarginate. 



In marshes and swamps along the coast in s. Tex., Apr. -July; from s. Tex. 

 and Mex. s. to S.A. and W.I. 



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