''Gazania'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Asteraceae,

native Native may refer to: People * Jus soli, citizenship by right of birth * Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory ** Native Americans (disambiguation) In arts and entert ...

to Southern Africa.Per Ola Karis. 2007. "Arctotideae" pages 200-207. In: Klaus Kubitzki (series editor); Joachim W. Kadereit and Charles Jeffrey (volume editors). ''The Families and Genera of Vascular Plants'' volume VIII. Springer-Verlag: Berlin; Heidelberg, Germany. They produce large, daisy-like composite flowerheads in brilliant shades of yellow and orange, over a long period in summer. They are often planted as drought-tolerant

groundcover Groundcover or ground cover is any plant that grows over an area of ground. Groundcover provides protection of the topsoil from erosion and drought. In an ecosystem, the ground cover forms the layer of vegetation below the shrub layer known as t ...

Taxonomic history

The genus was first formally described by German botanist Joseph Gaertner in the second volume of his major work '' De Fructibus et Seminibus Plantarum'' in 1791. Gaertner named the genus after Theodorus Gaza, a 15th-century translator of the works of Theophrastus.Seranne Howis, Nigel P. Barker, and Ladislav Mucina. 2009. "Globally grown, but poorly known: species limits and biogeography of ''Gazania'' Gaertn. (Asteraceae) inferred from chloroplast and nuclear DNA sequence data". ''Taxon'' 58(3):871-882. ''Gazania'' is a member of the tribe Arctotideae and the

subtribe Subtribe is a taxonomic category ranking which is below the rank of tribe and above genus. The standard suffix for a subtribe is -ina (in animals) or -inae (in plants Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plant ...

Gorteriinae. Within the subtribe it is close to ''

Hirpicium ''Hirpicium'' is a genus of Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it co ...

'' and ''

Gorteria ''Gorteria'' is a genus of small annual herbaceous plants or shrubs, with 8 known species, that is assigned to the daisy family (Compositae or Asteraceae). Like in almost all Asteraceae, the individual flowers are 5-merous, small and clustered ...

''.Vicki A. Funk and Raymund Chan. 2008. "Phylogeny of the Spiny African Daisies (Compositae, tribe Arctotideae, subtribe Gorteriinae) based on ''trn''L-F, ''ndh''F, and ITS sequence data". ''Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution'' 48(1):47-60. Many of the species of ''Gazania'' are hard to distinguish and the number of species assigned to the genus has varied widely from one author to another. In 1959,

Helmut Roessler Helmut is a German name. Variants include Hellmut, Helmuth, and Hellmuth. From old German, the first element deriving from either ''heil'' ("healthy") or ''hiltja'' ("battle"), and the second from ''muot'' ("spirit, mind, mood"). Helmut may refer ...

published what he considered to be a preliminary revision of ''Gazania''. At that time, he recognized 16 species.Helmut Rössler. 1959. "Revision der Arctotideae - Gorteriinae (Compositae)". ''Mitteilungen der Botanischen Staatssammlung München'' 3:71-500. Roessler published some amendments to his treatment in 1973.Helmut Roessler. 1973. ''Mitteilungen der Botanischen Staatssammlung Muenchen'' 11:91-99. In 2009, a phylogeny of the genus was published. It was based on

molecular phylogenetic Molecular phylogenetics () is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships. From these analyses, it is possible to ...

analysis of

chloroplast A chloroplast () is a type of membrane-bound organelle known as a plastid that conducts photosynthesis mostly in plant and algal cells. The photosynthetic pigment chlorophyll captures the energy from sunlight, converts it, and stores it in ...

and

nuclear Nuclear may refer to: Physics Relating to the nucleus of the atom: * Nuclear engineering *Nuclear physics *Nuclear power *Nuclear reactor *Nuclear weapon *Nuclear medicine *Radiation therapy *Nuclear warfare Mathematics *Nuclear space *Nuclear ...

DNA sequence DNA sequencing is the process of determining the nucleic acid sequence – the order of nucleotides in DNA. It includes any method or technology that is used to determine the order of the four bases: adenine, guanine, cytosine, and thymine. Th ...

s. In this

study Study or studies may refer to: General * Education **Higher education * Clinical trial * Experiment * Observational study * Research * Study skills, abilities and approaches applied to learning Other * Study (art), a drawing or series of drawi ...

, all of Roessler's species except ''Gazania othonnites'' were sampled. The authors found that eight species were not really separate, but formed a species complex. The seven species found to be distinct were ''G. jurineifolia, G. caespitosa, G. ciliaris, G. tenuifolia, G. heterochaeta, G. schenckii,'' and ''G. lichtensteinii''.

Distribution

The genus occurs from low-altitude sands to alpine meadows in South Africa, Eswatini, Mozambique, Tanzania, and Angola. Additionally, species are

naturalised Naturalization (or naturalisation) is the legal act or process by which a non-citizen of a country may acquire citizenship or nationality of that country. It may be done automatically by a statute, i.e., without any effort on the part of the i ...

and declared weed in South Australia, New Zealand, the Mediterranean, and California.

Cultivation

''Gazania'' species are grown for the brilliant colour of their flowerheads which appear in the late spring and are often in bloom throughout the summer into autumn. They prefer a sunny position and are tolerant of dryness and poor soils. Numerous

cultivars A cultivar is a type of Horticulture, cultivated plant that people have selected for desired phenotypic trait, traits and when Plant propagation, propagated retain those traits. Methods used to propagate cultivars include: division, root and st ...

have been selected for variety of colour and habit. In temperate regions, they are usually grown as half-hardy annuals. A commonly grown variety is the trailing gazania (''

Gazania rigens ''Gazania'' is a genus of flowering plants in the family Asteraceae, native to Southern Africa.Per Ola Karis. 2007. "Arctotideae" pages 200-207. In: Klaus Kubitzki (series editor); Joachim W. Kadereit and Charles Jeffrey (volume editors). ''The ...

'' var. ''leucolaena''). It is commonly used as

and can be planted ''en masse'' to cover large areas or embankments, assisted by its fast growth rate. Cultivars of this variety include 'Sunburst', 'Sunglow', and 'Sunrise Yellow'. Another popular cultivated variety is the clumping gazania (''

''), which has a number of named cultivars including 'Aztec', 'Burgundy', 'Copper King', 'Fiesta Red', 'Goldrush' and 'Moonglow'. The following cultivars have gained the Royal Horticultural Society’s

Award of Garden Merit The Award of Garden Merit (AGM) is a long-established annual award for plants by the British Royal Horticultural Society (RHS). It is based on assessment of the plants' performance under UK growing conditions. History The Award of Garden Merit ...

: * ''G.'' ‘Aztec’ * ''G.'' ‘Cookei’ * ''G. rigens'' ‘Variegata’ * Talent Series

Species

Gallery

Image:Gazania heterochaeta.jpg, ''Gazania heterochaeta'' Goegap N.R., Namaqualand, Northern Cape, South Africa Image:Gazania lichtensteinii.JPG, ''Gazania lichtensteinii'' Goegap N.R., Namaqualand, Northern Cape, South Africa Image:Gazania rigens-1.jpg, ''Gazania rigens'' (flower) File:WhiteGazania.JPG, White and purple gazania File:Gazania Rigens Yellow White (1).jpg, Yellow and White variety of ''

'' File:Orange flowers 4.jpg , Orange gazania in Palestine File:Orange gazania in Palestine.jpg , Orange gazania in Palestine File:Gazania flower 2.jpg, Gazania flower with some dew droplets

References

External links

PlantZafrica.com: ''Gazania krebsiana''
{{Taxonbar, from=Q858999 Annual plants Asteraceae genera Flora of Southern Africa Garden plants of Africa zh:勋章菊