Talinum paniculatum
species of plant
Talinum paniculatum is a succulent subshrub in the family Talinaceae that is native to much of North and South America, and the Caribbean countries. It is commonly known as fameflower, Jewels-of-Opar (a name borrowed from the title of the novel Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar by Edgar Rice Burroughs), or pink baby's-breath.
Classification
The species was described in 1760 under the basionym of Portulaca paniculata by Nicolaus Joseph von Jacquin (1727–1817), then recombined in the genus Talinum in 1791 by Joseph Gaertner (1732–1791). In current classification, Talinum paniculatum belongs to the family Talinaceae, it was assigned in the past to the family of the purslane or Portulacaceae.
Appearance
Talinum paniculatum bears tuberous roots and panicles of flowers and produces tiny, jewel-like fruits. Its peculiarity is its very long root of orange colour that reaches about 80 centimeters. It is a very bad herb in crops, and it proliferates very easily, since it roots very easily, even after it has been plucked and if it has any part of the root in contact with the soil. The plant as a whole can reach almost 2 meters high measured from the soil surface, where after maturity, its brown seeds (in abundance) spread easily through the surrounding area.
Native range
Talinum paniculatum is native to the southern United States, much of Latin America (such as Paraguay and Uruguay) and the Caribbean. It has been introduced notably in Africa and Asia.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Talinum paniculatum” is species of plant. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Talinum, paniculatum and species, not as a finished interpretation.
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The phrase “species of plant” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Datasets, specimens, observations and peer-reviewed methods provide the appropriate test for the technical claims summarized here. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jan 27, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7679537. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1760, 1727, 1817 and 1791.
Current terminology should not be projected backward without checking the classification used when the underlying evidence was created. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Talinum paniculatum” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.