Boehmeria

Wilmot-Dear, C. M. & Friis, I., 2013, The Old World species of Boehmeria (Urticaceae, tribus Boehmerieae). A taxonomic revision, Blumea 58 (2), pp. 85-216 : 90

Boehmeria

Boehmeria Jacq. (1760) 9, 31. — Type: Boehmeria ramiflora Jacq.

Perennial herbs, shrubs or small trees; stems erect or sometimes scrambling. Stipules lateral or ± intrapetiolar, free or partly so, mostly long-persistent. Leaves opposite or alternate, usually petiolate, often dimorphic (those of a dimorphic pair of opposite or adjacent alternate leaves are here referred to as ‘smaller’ and ‘larger’ leaves in the descriptions of the species); lamina 3-veined from base and with variable number of upper lateral veins, margin dentate, serrate or crenate, often asymmetrical with a wider half with many teeth and a narrower half with fewer teeth; indumentum variable (often characteristic for a species or infraspecific taxon); cystoliths punctiform. Plants monoecious or dioecious. Inflorescence-bearing axes terminal or axillary, branched or unbranched, sometimes modified by partial or complete reduction of leaves. Flowers grouped into inflorescences which are dense, rather small to medium-sized sessile bisexual or unisexual clusters of flowers, clusters single either in axils of normal leaves or arranged along modified axes and each subtended by a single bract and well-spaced to contiguous. Each flower subtended by a triangular chaffy often reddish bracteole. Male flowers (3–)4(–5–6)-merous; stamens of the same number as perianth, opposite perianth-lobes; vestige of gynoecium present. Female flowers with perianth tubular, completely enclosing ovary, contracted and with several small teeth at apex; style linear, usually short; stigma linear, long, unilaterally papillose or long-papillose on all sides, nearly always long-persistent. Fruiting perianth persistent and firmly attached to achene, with which it is dispersed, sometimes markedly dorsiventrally flattened into ‘shoulders’ or prominent lateral wings. Achene s ovoid, surface dull.

A genus of 47 species, with 33 indigenous species in the Old World and 14 indigenous species in the New World ( Wilmot-Dear & Friis 1996, Wilmot-Dear et al. 2003), pantropical and extending into warm temperate regions, but absent from Europe and with limited distribution in Australia.