What type of Inflorescence would these Jovibarba & Sempervivum bloom stalks be?
I am having a very difficult time understanding how to break the information down.

J. braunii


Pacific Devil's Food


Pacific Magic Night


Witcherii

They appear to be panicles.

Thank you Kent.

Those are pretty cool.

Thank you jmorth. The sad part is, once a rosette blooms it dies. But look at all the offsets it leaves behind to replace itself. : )

Inflorescences of both Sempervivum spp. and Jovibarba spp. are cymes.
http://www.efloras.org/florata...
http://www.efloras.org/florata...

Quoting from Plant Identification Terminology by Harris and Harris:

Cyme. A flat-topped or rounded-topped terminal inflorescence, paniculate, in which the terminal flower blooms first.

I really need to study up on all these flower terms. I have such a difficult time reading the word descriptions and seeing in my mind what they should look like.
Thank you for the links Rick.

I highly recommend the book, even for non-technical plant lovers, simply because it shows the complexity of plant growth, and opens one's eyes to actually studying a plant, rather than just noting its color (for instance).

The way plants seem to grow and how they actually grow is often different, too.

I thought someone might question that in a cyme "the terminal flowers bloom first", which would seem not to be the case with semps and jovibarbas. Wouldn't one think logically that the end of what we see as the branch/spike/scape would be the terminus? And thus flowers blooming before the end are not terminal?

In the case of these two genera, each flower that blooms is the end of the branch, and a new branch begins below the flower to produce the next flower that blooms. Meanwhile, yet another branch begins at the base of flower #2 to produce flower #3, and so on.

So the string of, say, eight blooms is actually 8 separate branches, botanically speaking, even though it looks like just one. Quite a revelation if you understand what I am relaying! Thus, a semp rosette that produces 50 flowers, actually has 50 branches!

Like this?

Goodness, sorry it took sooooo long. Yes, like that, Lynn.

It looks like there are only six branches, but technically and botanically speaking, there are as many branches as there are flowers.

Thank you Rick.

Hi Lynn, Inflorescences among many other things are difficult for me to id and to learn. Believe it or not this Wikipedia site has the best drawings and picture examples that made sense to me. Hope this helps. If this information on the site is incorrect in any way I hope someone would let us know and also correct it at Wikipedia as some entries there are by private citizens.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I...

Wow, Cheryl I love that site, thank you so much. I can understand what they are teaching, and it really helps to have photos of the actually flowers. Now to study it.

That wiki entry actually seems pretty accurate. Not that I know all that stuff, but of the stuff I do know, the only thing I did notice was rather nitpicky:

It gives the idea that sympodial and cymose are synonyms, and monopodial and racemose are synonyms. When speaking of inflorescences, I suppose they are.

But sympodial and monopodial are broad terms that can be applied to many structures, and not just other plant parts, while cymose and racemose apply only to inflorescences.

Yes, I admit it - I really am a plant geek.

Wow, I'm not really sure what you just said Rick. But I will learn.

I WANT TO LEARN PLANT GEEK SPEAK!!!!!!!!!!

valleylynn said: Wow, I'm not really sure what you just said Rick. But I will learn.

It's analogous to the more common:
--- All azaleas are rhododendrons, but not all rhododendrons are azaleas.
Meaning: azaleas are a subgroup of rhododendrons.

So:
--- All cymes (cymous) are sympodia (sympodial), but not all sympodia are cymes.
Meaning: cymes are a subgroup of sympodia (that refer only to the inflorescence).

And:
--- All racemes (racemous) are monopodia (monopodial), but not all monopodia are racemes.
Meaning: Racemes are a subgroup of monopodia (that refer only to the inflorescence).

--
Remember too, that in Latin, --ium is singular, --ia is plural. So:
--- monopodium, sympodium (singular nouns)
---monopodia, sympodia (plural nouns)

Okay, I am understanding a little more, like about all azaleas are rhododendrons, but not all rhododendrons are azaleas. Which make it easier for me the understand the other parts of what you said.