The Genera of Leguminosae-Caesalpinioideae and Swartzieae
| The Genera of Leguminosae-Caesalpinioideae and Swartzieae | |
Dewindtia De Wild.
Habit and leaf form. Trees, or shrubs, or herbs, or climbers or scramblers; without tendrils; unarmed. Phyllotaxy spiral. Leaves compound; pinnate, or bifoliate; paripinnate. Venation neither palmate nor parallel nor fan-like. Leaflets many per leaf, or few per leaf; opposite or sub-opposite; without a continuous marginal nerve; sessile to sub-sessile. Stipules absent or early caducous or very inconspicuous; neither leafy nor spinescent; connate, or not connate. Stipels absent.
Inflorescence and floral morphology. Flowers small; hermaphrodite; not pentamerous throughout; departing from pentamery in the calyx, in the corolla, and in the androecium; in simple racemes (short); not distichous. Inflorescences axillary and terminal; of racemose units. Bracts absent at anthesis (caducous, minute). Bracteoles present; relatively large and enclosing the flower buds; persistent beyond anthesis; valvate. Hypanthium present (cupular). Length of floral tube relative to total hypanthium plus calyx length, about 0.5. Calyx polysepalous; not covering the rest of the flower in bud; 0–6 partite (minute); not Swartzieae type. Corolla present, or absent (rare); very zygomorphic, or usually 1 orbicular petal; polypetalous; without any greatly reduced petals. Petals 1, or 2–3 (rare). Clawed petals absent. Disk absent. Androecium of fewer than ten parts (the filaments short); with staminodia, or without staminodia. Fertile stamens 3–6, or 8 (rare). Anthers attached well above base of connective. Ovary stipitate; excentric with adnate stipe (the style filiform). Ovules few.
Fruit, seed and seedling. Fruit a two-valved pod; becoming distinctly woody; with veins other than the longitudinal ones predominating; conspicuously winged, or not winged; valves twisting and enrolling during dehiscence. Seeds not arillate; with a straight or slightly oblique radicle; amyloid-positive. Cotyledons flat; of Type 4; with a vascular system in one plane; epigeal.
Transverse section of lamina. Leaves with 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. Epidermal crystals not seen either adaxially or abaxially. Simple unbranched hairs common; scabrid. No compound or branched eglandular hairs seen. Capitate glands not seen. Hooked hairs not seen. Cassieae-type leaf pseudo-glands not seen. Expanded and embedded hair-feet present, or absent; all medium to thick-walled; hair feet all simple, without vertical walls. Basally bent hairs present. Adaxial interveinal epidermal cell walls markedly sinuous in high-focus optical section; not conspicuously pitted; thick. Stomata adaxially very rare. Abaxial stomata predominantly paracytic. Abaxial epidermis not papillate. Abaxial interveinal epidermal cell walls markedly sinuous in high-focus optical section; not conspicuously pitted in optical section; staining normally with safranin.
Wood anatomy. Wood not storied.
Cytology, geography, etc. 15 species. Africa. Tropical and southern Africa. Not widely cultivated.
Tribe. Detarieae (Amherstieae of Cowan and Polhill 1981).
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’.