Canna indica

Las cannáceas (Cannaceae) son una familia de plantas herbáceas, perennes y rizomatosas pertenecientes al orden Zingiberales de las monocotiledóneas. La familia presenta un solo género, Canna, con 23 especies conocidas como "achiras" o "cañas de Indias". Son plantas tropicales y subtropicales nativas de América que se caracterizan por sus hojas dísticas, sus flores con un estambre petaloide con una sola teca y sus estaminodios que parecen pétalos. Diferentes especies de Canna se cultivan para la alimentación humana en varias regiones del mundo: en México y las Antillas, en los Andes (desde Colombia hasta Argentina), como así también en Hawái, Australia, Vietnam, China e Indonesia. Se destaca Canna indica como la más conocida, variable y distribuida entre estas especies. Algunas son cultivadas con fines ornamentales, especialmente en Francia, España, Inglaterra, Hungría, otros lugares de Europa y en Brasil.

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Canna (or Canna lily, although not a true lily) is a genus of approximately twenty species of flowering plants. The closest living relations to cannas are the other plant families of the order Zingiberales, that is the gingers, bananas, marantas, heliconias, strelitzias, etc.

Canna is the only genus in the family Cannaceae. Such a family has almost universally been recognized by taxonomists. The APG II system of 2003 (unchanged from the APG system, 1998) also recognizes the family, and assigns it to the order Zingiberales in the clade commelinids, in the monocots.

The species have large, attractive foliage and horticulturists have turned it into a large-flowered, brash, bright and sometimes gaudy, garden plant. In addition, it is one of the world's richest starch sources, and is an agricultural plant.

Although a plant of the tropics, most cultivars have been developed in temperate climates and are easy to grow in most countries of the world as long as they can enjoy about 6 hours average sunlight during the summer. See the Canna cultivar gallery for photographs of Canna cultivars.

The name Canna originates from the Celtic word for a cane or reed.