| Asparagaceae, a monocot and a member of the order Asparagales, possess great diversity throughout Africa and especially in South Africa. Asparagus (Asparagaceae) is highly diverse with hermaphroditic and unisexual taxa, a variety of growth forms (herbs, shrubs, and vines), and vegetative morphology (phylloclade morphology, presence or absences of spines). The seeds are ovoid to globular but are characterized by their black color.; Limited phylogenetic studies of Asparagus have previously been performed; these studies have employed very low taxon sampling which limits their utility for investigating patterns of morphological evolution. An estimate of phylogeny for the genus utilizing sequences from the nrDNA internal transcribed spacer region provided a large number of parsimony informative characters for phylogeny reconstruction. Myrsiphyllum was shown to be monophyletic but weakly supported. Flower arrangement did not produce any monophyletic groups and the presence or absence of spines formed no monophyletic groups except for the weakly supported Myrsiphyllum . |
