[4] They produce a basal rosette of leaves and often lack a true stem, instead sending up a scape, a flowering stalk topped with an inflorescence.

[1] The mating systems found in genus Leavenworthia have been studied extensively because they are variable and have changed several times in the evolutionary history of the group.

L. exigua, L. torulosa, and L. uniflora are self-compatible, able to produce seed from ovules fertilized by their own pollen.

At at least three points in the history of Leavenworthia there have been transitions between mating systems, in which self-incompatible plants evolved self-compatibility, developing the ability to fertilize their own ovules.

[7] Self-compatible plants are also shaped differently, with smaller flowers in which the pollen-bearing anthers are positioned closer to the stigma.