The Families of Flowering Plants
The Families of Flowering Plants |
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~ Amaranthaceae, Chenopodiaceae
Habit and leaf form. Small, prostrate herbs. Annual to perennial; with neither basal nor terminal aggregations of leaves. Mesophytic, or xerophytic. Leaves small; alternate; petiolate; non-sheathing; aromatic; simple; epulvinate. Lamina entire. Leaves exstipulate. Lamina margins entire, or crenate. Leaves without a persistent basal meristem.
Leaf anatomy. Stomata present; diacytic (?). Hairs present; glandular, or eglandular and glandular.
Stem anatomy. Secondary thickening developing from a conventional cambial ring, or anomalous; when anomalous, via concentric cambia. Sieve-tube plastids P-type; type III (c, without a crystal, cf. Chenopodiaceae).
Reproductive type, pollination. Plants gynomonoecious, or monoecious, or polygamomonoecious (?).
Inflorescence, floral, fruit and seed morphology. Flowers aggregated in ‘inflorescences’; in fascicles and in spikes. Inflorescences terminal, or axillary; fasciculate, or crowded and spicate. Flowers minute. Hypogynous disk absent.
Perianth sepaline; (1–)3–4; free, or joined (basally); 1 whorled; accrescent. Calyx (if perianth so interpreted) (1–)3–4; polysepalous, or gamosepalous (basally); persistent; accrescent (surrounding the fruit, becoming winged); valvate.
Androecium 1(–2). Androecial members free of the perianth; free of one another (exserted); 1 whorled. Androecium exclusively of fertile stamens. Stamens 1, or 2; reduced in number relative to the adjacent perianth to isomerous with the perianth; oppositisepalous. Anthers introrse. Pollen grains aperturate; 13–50 aperturate (?); (poly) foraminate.
Gynoecium (2–)3 carpelled. The pistil 1 celled. Gynoecium syncarpous; synovarious, or synstylovarious; superior. Ovary 1 locular. Styles 1, or 2; apical. Ovules in the single cavity 1; non-arillate; hemianatropous (?).
Fruit non-fleshy; indehiscent; a nut (surrounded by the broadly winged perianth). Seeds non-endospermic (?). Perisperm present (?). Embryo well differentiated. Embryo curved (‘circular, surrounding the endosperm’).
Seedling. Germination phanerocotylar.
Physiology, biochemistry. Anatomy non-C4 type (Dysphania).
Geography, cytology. Australia.
Taxonomy. Subclass Dicotyledonae; Crassinucelli. Dahlgren’s Superorder Caryophylliflorae; Caryophyllales. Cronquist’s Subclass Caryophyllidae; Caryophyllales. APG (1998) Eudicot; core Eudicot; neither Rosid nor Asterid; Caryophyllales (as a synonym of Amaranthaceae). Species 5. Genera 1; only genus, Dysphania.
This description is offered for casual browsing only. We strongly advise against extracting comparative information from it. This is much more easily achieved using the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting specified attributes, summaries of attributes within groups of taxa, geographical distribution, genera included in each family, classifications (Dahlgren; Dahlgren, Clifford, and Yeo; Cronquist; APG), and notes on the APG classification.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 1992 onwards. The families of flowering plants: descriptions, illustrations, identification, and information retrieval. Version: 10th April 2008. http://delta-intkey.com’.