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Lemnaceae (Genus comprising seven species)

A genus comprising seven species of small, floating herbs, distributed over Europe, Northern Asia, and North America, but rare in the tropics, five being natives of Britain. These plants are without distinct stems, or real leaves, "but consist of small, leaf-like fronds, either separate, or cohering two or three together by their edges, emitting, in most species, one or more fibres from their under surface into the water, and multiplying by similar fronds growing out of their edges. Flowers very rare, appearing from a fissure in the edge, or on the upper surface of the frond" (Bentham). The species are of no horticultural value. The pretty little Chilian Nertera depressa, with its red fruits, sometimes passes in gardens under the absurdly wrong name of Fruiting Duckweed.