hr Ne. 
Solanaceae 339 
SOLANACEAE Potato Family 
Herbs or shrubs or trees (not ours), sometimes vines. Leaves alternate (ours) or 
rarely opposite, entire to dissected, pinnately veined (ours); stipules none. Flowers per- 
fect, regular, often large, either solitary in the leaf-axils or stem-forks, or else clustered., 
Calyx mostly 5-toothed or -lobed. Corolla rotate or campanulate or salverform or funnel- 
form or tubular, mostly 5-lobed. Stamens as many as corolla-lobes, alternate with them, 
on the corolla-tube, all equal in length and perfect (ours). Ovary terete, superior, 2—8- 
celled; style slender, simple. Fruit a berry or a capsule. Seeds many. 
A. Corolla rotate or campanulate; fruit a berry, 2-celled. 
B. Flowers solitary in the leaf-axils; calyx in fruit enlarged, bladdery; corolla cam- 
panulate; anthers distinct. PHYSALIS (p. 339) 
BB. Flowers in clusters; calyx in fruit not conspicuously enlarged, not bladdery; co- 
rolla rotate; anthers closely fitted together into a cone. SOLANUM (p. 339): 
AA. Corolla tubular or salverform or funnelform; fruit a capsule, often more than 
2-celled. 
C. Leaves dentate; flowers solitary in the forks of the stems; capsule prickly. 
DATURA (p. 340) 
CC. Leaves entire; flowers in clusters; capsule not prickly. NICOTIANA (p. 340) 
PHYSALIS GROUND CHERRY 
- Herbs, annual or perennial. Leaves entire or sinuately toothed. Flowers solitary in 
the leaf-axils (ours), peduncles slender. Calyx campanulate; in fruit enlarged and blad- 
dery-inflated, membranous, 5—10-angled or -ribbed, wholly enclosing the fruit, its teeth 
usually meeting. Corolla whitish or yellowish, with dark center (ours), open-campanulate 
or rarely campanulate-rotate, plicate. Stamens near base of corolla. Stigma minutely 
2-cleft. Berry pulpy. Seeds kidney-shaped, flattish, with thin edge, finely pitted. (Gk. 
physalis—a bladder, from the inflated calyx.) 
A. Annual; leaves ovate to cordate or rarely some lanceolate, some of them always 
somewhat sinuate-toothed. 
B. Plant glabrous or merely puberulent; calyx in fruit obscurely 5—10-angled.  E. 
P. ixocarpa Brit. (Tomatillo) 
BB. Plant pubescent; calyx in fruit sharply 5-angled. E. (P. pruinosus for our 
region. ) P. pubescens L. 
AA. Perennial; leaves lanceolate to oblanceolate, entire or sinuate but not sinuate- 
toothed; stems glabrous to sparingly hirsute-pubescent. E: 
P. lanceolata Michx. 
SOLANUM NIGHTSHADE 
Herbs or shrubs, annual or perennial, sometimes climbing, often stellate-pubescent. 
Leaves alternate, in ours entire to 3-foliolate. Flowers in cymes or umbels or panicles 
or racemes, white or blue or purple or yellow. Calyx campanulate or rotate; in fruit 
either enclosing the berry or persistent at its base. Corolla rotate, limb plicate; tube 
very short. Stamens on throat of corolla. Ovary usually 2-celled. Berry mostly 
globose. (Said to be from L. solamen—quieting; the Bittersweet is mildly narcotic.) 
A. Plant not prickly; corolla 8—20 mm. wide; anthers not tapering upward; calyx 
in fruit not spiny, not nearly covering the berry. 
B. Climbing or twining; without stellate pubescence; leaves either entire or else with 
a lobe or leaflet near the base at one side or both sides but otherwise entire; peren- 
mal; W..E. §, dulcamara L. (Bittersweet) 
