Plant Gardens 101

Cucumber family
Cucurbitaceae
Mo-more’di-ka. Over 40 species of tropical Asian or African tendril-bearing, high-climbing vines, 2 grown for their decorative fruit.

Description
Leaves alternate, heavy, compound or deeply divided. Male and female flowers separate, sometimes on the same plant, both solitary (in cultivated species), yellow or white, the stalk bearing a prominent bract. Corolla bell-shaped or more open, parted nearly to the base. Fruit oblongish or globe-shaped, splitting at maturity.

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Cucumber family
Cucurbitaceae
Laj-en-a’ri-a. A small genus of herbaceous vines, native in the tropics of the Old World and South America, related to the melons.

Description
Leaves broadly heart-shaped to ovate, with irregular margins. Flowers solitary, white, male flowers with long pedicle, female flower with ovary below petals.  

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Cucumber family
Cucurbitaceae
Ben-in-kay’sa. A pumpkinlike and tendril-bearing Asiatic vine. Known here for its ornamental fruit; in China it is the source of the Chinese preserving melon.

Description
Fleshy and creeping vine. Leaves alternate, large, and angled. Flowers solitary, yellow, large, the stamens and pistils never in the same flower. Fruit large, melonlike, but without a hard rind.

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Cucumber family
Cucurbitaceae
Ee-ky-no-sis’tis. Herbaceous vines, comprising about 25 species from North or South America, only one of garden interest.

Description
Leaves palmately divided with 3-7 lobes. Male flowers in panicles, corolla with 6 lobes. Female flowers solitary or paired in small axils.

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Cucumber family
Cucurbitaceae
Luf’fa. A small genus of tropical Old World gourds, grown chiefly for their ornamental fruits.

Description
Tendril-bearing, quick-growing, herbaceous vines. Leaves alternate, 5- to 7-lobed. Flowers yellowish or whitish, male flowers in racemes, the female solitary. Petals 5. Fruit with a dry or papery rind, the interior fibrous. The dried, fibrous, cucumber- or club-shaped skeletons of the fruit are sold in tropical markets to be used as sponges.

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Cucumber family
Cucurbitaceae
Kew-kur’bi-ta. Mostly annual, trailing or climbing vines, comprising perhaps 20 species, and chiefly tropical. Includes Squash, Pumpkin, and many ornamental gourds.

Description
Mostly rough-hairy vines with forked tendrils and large leaves, often lobed. Flowers yellow, large, usually more or less bell-shaped, but lobed halfway down the tube. Fruit a large berry, smooth-skinned or deeply furrowed, with wide range of forms.

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