Ray flower in the context of "Involucral bract"

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⭐ Core Definition: Ray flower

Asteraceae (/ˌæstəˈrsi., -ˌ/ ) is a large family of flowering plants that consists of over 32,000 known species in over 1,900 genera within the order Asterales. The number of species in Asteraceae is rivaled only by the Orchidaceae, and which is the larger family is unclear as the quantity of extant species in each family is unknown. The Asteraceae were first described in the year 1740 and given the original name Compositae. The family is commonly known as the aster, daisy, composite, or sunflower family.

Most species of Asteraceae are herbaceous plants, and may be annual, biennial, or perennial, but there are also shrubs, vines, and trees. The family has a widespread distribution, from subpolar to tropical regions, in a wide variety of habitats. Most occur in hot desert and cold or hot semi-desert climates, and they are found on every continent but Antarctica. Their common primary characteristic is compound flower heads, technically known as capitula, consisting of sometimes hundreds of tiny individual florets enclosed by a whorl of protective involucral bracts.

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Ray flower in the context of Dimorphotheca pluvialis

Dimorphotheca pluvialis, common names white African daisy, Cape marigold, weather prophet, Cape rain-daisy, ox-eye daisy, Cape daisy or rain daisy, is a plant species native to South Africa and Namibia. It is sparingly naturalized in scattered locations in California.

Dimorphotheca pluvialis is an annual herb up to 40 cm (16 in) tall. It has long, narrow leaves, sometimes entire but sometimes toothed or pinnately lobed. Ray flowers are white to yellowish, sometimes with blue or purple markings. Disc flowers are usually white to yellowish with purple tips.

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Ray flower in the context of Pseudanthium

A pseudanthium (Ancient Greek for 'false flower'; pl.: pseudanthia) is an inflorescence that resembles a flower. The word is sometimes used for other structures that are neither a true flower nor a true inflorescence. Examples of pseudanthia include flower heads, composite flowers, or capitula, which are special types of inflorescences in which anything from a small cluster to hundreds or sometimes thousands of flowers are grouped together to form a single flower-like structure. Pseudanthia take various forms. The real flowers (the florets) are generally small and often greatly reduced, but the pseudanthium itself can sometimes be quite large (as in the heads of some varieties of sunflower).

Pseudanthia are characteristic of the daisy and sunflower family (Asteraceae), whose flowers are differentiated into ray flowers and disk flowers, unique to this family. The disk flowers in the center of the pseudanthium are actinomorphic and the corolla is fused into a tube. Flowers on the periphery are zygomorphic and the corolla has one large lobe (the so-called "petals" of a daisy are individual ray flowers, for example). Either ray or disk flowers may be absent in some plants: Senecio vulgaris lacks ray flowers and Taraxacum officinale lacks disk flowers. The individual flowers of a pseudanthium in the family Asteraceae (or Compositae) are commonly called florets. The pseudanthium has a whorl of bracts below the flowers, forming an involucre.

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