The Families of Flowering Plants
The Families of Flowering Plants | |
Habit and leaf form. Trees and shrubs; bearing essential oils. Self supporting, or climbing; the climbers scrambling. Leaves opposite; petiolate; gland-dotted; aromatic, or without marked odour (?); simple. Lamina entire; pinnately veined; cross-venulate. Leaves exstipulate. Lamina margins dentate. Leaves without a persistent basal meristem.
Leaf anatomy. Stomata present; paracytic.
Adaxial hypodermis absent. Lamina dorsiventral. The mesophyll with spherical etherial oil cells.
Stem anatomy. Cork cambium present; initially superficial. Nodes unilacunar (with two traces). Secondary thickening developing from a conventional cambial ring. Xylem with fibre tracheids. Vessel end-walls scalariform. Sieve-tube plastids S-type.
Reproductive type, pollination. Plants hermaphrodite, or polygamomonoecious, or polygamodioecious.
Inflorescence, floral, fruit and seed morphology. Flowers aggregated in ‘inflorescences’; in cymes, or in racemes, or in panicles. The terminal inflorescence unit cymose. Inflorescences terminal, or axillary; racemes or panicles. Flowers bracteate; bracteolate (the numerous bracteoles passing imperceptibly into the perianth); small; regular; partially acyclic, or acyclic. The androecium acyclic, or the perianth acyclic and the androecium acyclic. Floral receptacle not markedly hollowed (more or less flat).
Perianth sepaline (inseparable from ‘bracteoles’); 10–50 (decussate pairs, or spiral); free.
Androecium (7–)10–20(–23). Androecial members maturing centripetally; free of the perianth; free of one another; 2–3 seriate, spiralled. Androecium exclusively of fertile stamens. Stamens 7–23; filantherous. Anthers basifixed; non-versatile; dehiscing via longitudinal slits; introrse to latrorse; appendaged (via a shortly produced, tonguelike connective). Pollen shed as single grains. Pollen grains aperturate; 2 aperturate (Piptocalyx), or 8–12 aperturate (Trimenia); more or less foraminate (with two irregular unthickened areas in Piptocalyx, 8–12 foramina in Trimenia).
Gynoecium 1 carpelled (ostensibly), or 2 carpelled. The pistil 1 celled. Gynoecium monomerous (pseudomonomerous, by abortion?), or syncarpous; of one carpel, or eu-syncarpous; superior. Carpel (if considered monomerous) non-stylate; apically stigmatic; 1 ovuled. Placentation apical. Ovary if considered syncarpous, 1 locular. Gynoecium non-stylate. Placentation apical. Ovules in the single cavity 1; pendulous; non-arillate; anatropous.
Fruit fleshy. The fruiting carpel indehiscent; if considered monomerous, drupaceous. Fruit if considered syncarpous, indehiscent; a drupe (with thin, slimy flesh); 1 seeded (compressed). Seeds endospermic. Embryo straight.
Physiology, biochemistry. Aluminium accumulation demonstrated.
Geography, cytology. Sub-tropical to tropical. Eastern Malaysia, Eastern Australia, Pacific.
Taxonomy. Subclass Dicotyledonae; Crassinucelli. Dahlgren’s Superorder Magnoliiflorae; Laurales. Cronquist’s Subclass Magnoliidae; Laurales. APG (1998) oddment family. Species 5. Genera 1, or 2; Piptocalyx (= Trimenia), Trimenia.
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’.