2. Peritoma de Candolle in A. P. de Candolle and A. L. P. P. de Candolle, Prodr. 1: 23. 1824.
Bee-plant [Greek peri, all around, and tome, cutting, perhaps alluding to dehiscence of fruit]
Staria S. Vanderpool, Hugh H. Iltis
Cleome Linnaeus [unranked] Atalanta Nuttall, Gen. N. Amer. Pl. 2: 73. 1818, not Atalantia Corrêa 1805; Celome Greene; Isomeris Nuttall
Herbs or shrubs, annual or (weak) perennial. Stems sparsely or profusely branched; glabrous, or glabrate, or glandular-pubescent. Leaves: stipules scalelike, bristlelike, or absent; petiole with pulvinus basally or distally; leaflets 3 or 5, (conduplicate and flat). Inflorescences terminal or axillary (from distal leaves), racemes (flat-topped or elongated); bracts usually present. Flowers zygomorphic; sepals persistent or deciduous, distinct or partly connate (1/3-1/2 of lengths), equal (each often subtending a nectary); petals equal; stamens 6; filaments inserted on cylindric androgynophore (usually expanded adaxially into a gibbous or flattened appendage), glabrous; anthers (linear), coiling as pollen is released; gynophore usually recurved in fruit (sometimes reflexed). Fruits capsules (erect to pendent), dehiscent, usually oblong (obovoid, subglobose, or fusiform in P. arborea). Seeds 5-38, globose, obovoid, triangular, or horseshoe-shaped, not arillate, (cleft fused between ends). x = 10.
Species 6 (6 in the flora): North America, Mexico.
