Rosids

Colophospermum mopane

Colophospermum mopane (mopane, turpentine tree, butterfly tree) is a Fabaceae tree dominating over 500,000 km² of south-central African savanna, host of edible mopane worms, drought- and fire-tolerant, IUCN least concern.

Colutea

Colutea (bladder senna) is a genus of about 28 deciduous legume shrubs from the Mediterranean to China and NE Africa, with inflated bladder-like pods, yellow or reddish pea flowers, and ornamental, forage, and erosion-control uses.

Combretaceae

Combretaceae R.Br., the combretum or terminalia family, is a pantropical Myrtales plant family of 10 genera and about 568 species, sister to the rest of the order, with Combretum and Terminalia its largest genera and mangrove members Lumnitzera, Conocarpus, and Laguncularia.

Copaifera

Copaifera, first published in 1762, is a genus of about 41 accepted legume tree species of tropical America, Africa, and Borneo, known for the copaiba oleoresin tapped from their trunks.

Corchorus

Corchorus is a pantropical Malvaceae genus of about 74 species, including C. capsularis and C. olitorius, the two jute fiber crops, whose leaves are also eaten and used in folk medicine.

Corchorus olitorius

Corchorus olitorius (jute mallow, molokhia, ewedu) is an annual Malvaceae herb of the tropical Old World grown for edible mucilaginous leaves and jute fiber; leaves provide 207 mg calcium and 6.3 mg iron per 100 g.

Coriaria

Coriaria, sole genus of Coriariaceae in Cucurbitales, is a shrub genus with a strikingly disjunct Mediterranean, Himalayan, Australasian, and American distribution, nitrogen-fixing root nodules, and picrotoxin-like toxins (tutin, coriamyrtin).

Cormus domestica

Cormus domestica, the true service tree (syn. Sorbus domestica L.), is a monospecific Rosaceae genus and wild fruit tree of southern Europe and northwest Africa, with bletted sorb-apple fruits, fissured bark, and a disputed taxonomy between Cormus, Sorbus, and Pyrus.

Coronilla

Coronilla (crownvetch) is a genus of about 24 accepted Fabaceae herbs and subshrubs native from Europe and the Mediterranean to Turkmenistan and N. Somalia, with jointed loment pods; C. varia is used for erosion control but is toxic and invasive.

Correa

Correa, Australian genus of 11 Rutaceae shrub species (native fuchsia), named for Portuguese botanist Correa da Serra; tubular nectar-rich flowers, frequent hybrids, popular garden plants.

Corylus

Corylus is a genus of trees and shrubs in the birch family, native to the temperate Northern Hemisphere, whose species produce the edible nuts known as hazelnuts.

Corymbia

Corymbia, the bloodwood eucalypts, a genus of about 95 Australian and New Guinean Myrtaceae trees split from Eucalyptus in 1995; includes spotted gums and ghost gums; non-monophyletic, with Blakella proposed as a separate genus in 2024.

Corymbia citriodora

Corymbia citriodora, the lemon-scented gum (formerly Eucalyptus citriodora), is an Australian Myrtaceae tree from Queensland to NE New South Wales, grown for citronellal-rich essential oil, heavy-construction timber, and ornamental planting.

Cotoneaster

Cotoneaster, a Rosaceae genus of berry-bearing shrubs native to temperate Eurasia and North Africa, with 270 to 400 species, apomictic polyploid taxonomy, and several invasive ornamental species.

Cotton

Cotton (Gossypium spp.), also called upland cotton (Gossypium hirsutum) or Pima (G. barbadense), is the world's dominant natural textile fiber, a nearly pure cellulose single-celled seed trichome; domesticated millennia ago and grown mainly in China, India, Brazil, and the United States.

Cowpea

Cowpea (Vigna unguiculata, black-eyed pea) is an African legume domesticated in West Africa 5,000-6,000 years ago, grown on about 12 million hectares for seed protein, fodder, and soil-improving nitrogen fixation.

Crambe

Crambe L. is a Brassicaceae genus of about 30-37 herb species from Europe, Macaronesia, and Asia, whose type species is sea kale; C. abyssinica is an industrial oilseed crop rich in erucic acid.

Crassula muscosa

Crassula muscosa (watch chain, rattail crassula, princess pine) is a South African and Namibian Crassulaceae succulent subshrub with four-ranked scale-like leaves on wiry stems, described by Linnaeus in 1760, Least Concern, widely cultivated.

Crassula ovata

Crassula ovata, the jade plant (also money plant, lucky plant; Japanese kanenonaruki カネノナルキ), is a succulent Crassulaceae shrub native from SE Mozambique to South Africa's Cape, widely grown as a houseplant; synonym Crassula argentea, Least Concern.

Crataegus

Crataegus (hawthorn) is a Rosaceae genus of thorny shrubs and small trees of temperate Eurasia and North America, with roughly 150–260 species, complicated by hybridization, polyploidy, and apomixis.

Crataegus monogyna

Crataegus monogyna, common or single-seed hawthorn (aubepine), a thorny Rosaceae tree native from Europe to Iraq and North Africa, widely naturalized and invasive in North America and Australia, used medicinally.

Crotalaria juncea

Crotalaria juncea (sunn hemp, Indian hemp) is a tropical Fabaceae annual legume from Afghanistan to Indo-China, grown for bast fiber, green manure, and weed- and nematode-suppressing cover crops, fixing 50–60 kg N/ha in 60–90 days.

Croton (plant)

Croton (plant): large Euphorbiaceae genus published by Linnaeus in 1753, about 1,100–1,300 species, mostly Neotropical; diterpenoid-rich, medicinal, and often confused with the ornamental Codiaeum variegatum.

Croton lechleri

Croton lechleri (sangre de grado, dragon's blood) is a South American Euphorbiaceae tree whose red latex yields crofelemer (Mytesi), an FDA-approved antidiarrheal for HIV/AIDS patients.

Cucumis metuliferus

Cucumis metuliferus, the kiwano or African horned melon, is a spiny annual Cucurbitaceae vine from Africa whose orange-red horned fruit is eaten and whose nematode and virus resistance makes it a melon rootstock.

Cucurbita maxima

Cucurbita maxima (winter squash; Hubbard squash, buttercup squash, giant pumpkin) is a domesticated Cucurbitaceae species of exclusively South American origin, with wild progenitor C. andreana, spread worldwide in the 19th century.

Cucurbitaceae

Cucurbitaceae, the gourd family, is a plant family of about 95 genera and 1,000 species of tendril-bearing vines in Cucurbitales, supplying cucumber, melon, watermelon, squash, and pumpkin; Asian Late Cretaceous origin, crops domesticated from c. 11,000 years ago.

Cucurbitales

Cucurbitales, the gourd and begonia order of flowering plants, a fabid rosid order of seven or eight families including Cucurbitaceae and Begoniaceae, sister to Fagales, with mostly unisexual flowers and major crops like squash, cucumber, and watermelon.

Cullen

Cullen Medik. is a genus of about 32-35 legume species (Fabaceae, tribe Psoraleeae), segregate of Psoralea, native from the Old World tropics to Australia, containing furanocoumarins and evaluated as dryland pasture.