The Genera of Leguminosae-Caesalpinioideae and Swartzieae
| The Genera of Leguminosae-Caesalpinioideae and Swartzieae | |
Habit and leaf form. Trees, or shrubs; without tendrils; armed, or unarmed. Leaves and inflorescences crowded on ‘short shoots’. Phyllotaxy distichous. Leaves compound; bipinnate; with opposite or sub-opposite leaflets. Leaflets many per leaf (small). Never having bipinnate leaves with short, spine-tipped rachides and flattened pinnae. Stipels absent.
Inflorescence and floral morphology. Flowers small; unisexual; not pentamerous throughout; departing from pentamery in the androecium, or in the corolla and in the androecium; coloured; in fascicled inflorescences (of spikes); not distichous (sessile). Inflorescences of racemose units. Bracteoles present; small, not enclosing the flower buds; persistent beyond anthesis. Hypanthium present. Length of floral tube relative to total hypanthium plus calyx length, about 0.25. Calyx polysepalous; not covering the rest of the flower in bud; 5 partite. Corolla present; actinomorphic; polypetalous; without any greatly reduced petals. Petals yellow; 5–6 (petals semi-orbicular); imbricate; imbricate-ascending. Disk absent. Androecium of more than ten parts; members all more or less equal in length; with staminodia (in pistillate flowers). Fertile stamens 12. Anthers attached at base of connective (but anther sagittate below). Stigma peltate. Ovules numerous.
Fruit, seed and seedling. Fruit indehiscent (fleshy); not becoming woody; not internally septate; not winged. Seeds endospermic; with a straight or slightly oblique radicle.
Transverse section of lamina. Leaves without conspicuous phloem transfer cells in the minor veins. Druses absent from the mesophyll. Mesophyll secretory cavities absent. Adaxial hypodermis absent. Leaf girders absent. Laminae dorsiventral. Mesophyll without unaligned fibres or sclereids. Minor veins mainly with abundant accompanying fibres.
Leaf lamina epidermes. Adaxial interveinal epidermal cell walls thick. Abaxial stomata not predominantly paracytic (actinocytic). Abaxial interveinal epidermal cell walls of medium thickness.
Pollen ultrastructure. Tectum reticulate; strongly irregularly coarse-reticulate. Length of colpi inapplicable — grain porate, no margocolpus. Foot layer of pollen wall smooth.
Cytology, geography, etc. 1 species. Santo Domingo. Not widely cultivated.
Tribe. Caesalpinieae.
The interactive key provides access to the character list, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting specified attributes, and summaries of attributes within groups of taxa.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 1993 onwards. The genera of Leguminosae-Caesalpinioideae and Swartzieae: descriptions, identification, and information retrieval. In English and French; French translation by E. Chenin. Version: 19th October 2005. http://delta-intkey.com’.