Daffodil Family – Amaryllidaceae

Flowers in this family have 6 tepals (sepals/petals) arranged as an inner set of three and an outer set of three. All flowers in this family have 6 anthers and one style and stigma. Daffodils have a corona attached to the top of the corolla tube.  Flowers  provide nectar for pollinators. This is a Monocot family. Monocots (Monocotyledons) germinate with one cotyledon (the first ‘seed leaf’ produced by the embryo, which may appear above ground or remain below), can’t form wood and have parallel leaf venation. They include orchids (20,000 species), grasses, food forms such as asparagus, onions and garlics, horticultural plants such as lilies, daffodils, irises, amaryllises, alliums, agapanthuses, bluebells and tulips and some tree forms such as Palms. Flower parts are usually in multiples of three.

Amaryllidaceae – Daffodil family – has1600 species in 3 sub-families –  Alloideae (Alliums), Agapanthoideae (Agapanthus) and Amaryllidoideae (Amaryllis). The family takes its name from the genus Amaryllis, which is the name of a Greek shepherdess in Virgil’s poem and  means ‘I shine’, referring to the brightness of the flower. Most grow from bulbs but Agapanthus grows from rhizomes.

Alliums are either food plants such as onion, garlic, shallot, leek, and chives or flowering alliums, known as ornamental onions, with large spherical umbel-like heads such as Allium hollandicum (shown in the photo above) or smaller egg-shaped heads such as Allium sphaerocephalon. Each head has many small flowers crowded together.

Agapanthus has 1 genus of 6 species. The type species is A. africanus. This is a native of the Cape, South Africa, called the African Lily. It is the only genus in the sub-family Agapanthoideae.