PLANT: Annual or perennial herbs, acaulescent or short-stemmed.

LEAVES: spirally arranged, usually all basal, estipulate, the venation parallel.

INFLORESCENCE: pedunculate, bracteate spikes.

FLOWERS: sympetalous, regular, perfect or imperfect; sepals 4, distinct and overlapping; corolla scarious, 4-lobed; stamens 4, adnate to corolla, alternating with the lobes; ovary superior, of 2 fused carpels, with 2 locules, the placentation axile; style 1; stigma 2-lobed.

FRUIT: a circumscissile capsule with 2-many seeds.

NOTES: Approximately 3 genera and 255 spp. (almost all in Plantago), cosmopolitan, some world-wide weeds.

REFERENCES: Huisinga, Kristin D. and Tina J. Ayers. 1999. Plantaginaceae. Ariz. - Nev. Acad. Sci. 32(1).