spine, a woody persistent thorn.
spur, a conical hollow projection in the tube or lower part of a petal, e.g., in some Scrophulariaceæ and Orchidaceæ.
squamæ, see scales.
squarrose, applied to imbricated scales, bracts or leaves having pointed tips and which are also spreading or recurved.
stamen, the male organ of the flower.
staminode, imperfect and barren stamen.
standard, the large upper petal in Papilionaceæ.
stellate, applied to a corolla the petals or lobes of which spread out like the rays of a star; also to branched hairs radiating from a centre.
sterile or barren, applied to stamens without pollen and to flowers without a pistil.
stigma, the upper part of the pistil on which the pollen settles before fertilizing the ovules.
stipe, a term applied to a stalk on any part of the plant except leaves and flowers.
stipellæ or stipels, subsidiary stipules of leaflets.
stipitate, stalked.
stipule, leaf-like appendages, often in pairs and winged at the base of the petiole in certain plants; when taking the form of spines they are known as stipular thorns, e.g., Acacia arabica, etc.
stolon, a horizontal runner.
striate, marked with longitudinal lines or furrows.
strigose, applied to shortish hair lying close along the surface in one direction.
strobilate, closely overlapping as the scales in the cone of a fir.
style, the portion of the pistil which bears the stigma.
subsessile, almost sessile.
subulate, awl-shaped.
succulent, juicy, sappy.
sulcate, grooved, fluted, furrowed.
superior ovary, an ovary which is free, i.e., not adnate to the calyx or perianth.
suture, the line along which similar organs cohere, e.g., carpellary leaves.
syncarpous, applied to an ovary composed of several carpels cohering to one another.
tendril, a thread-like process, usually an abortive petiole or peduncle, having the faculty of grasping and twining round objects and thus enabling the plant to climb.
terete, with a circular cross section, e.g., a cylinder.
ternate, in threes, whether three leaves in a verticil or 3 lobes or 3 leaflets of a leaf, but the last two are more commonly called tri-lobed or tri-fid and tri-foliolate respectively.
terrestrial, growing in the earth in contradistinction to epiphytes and tree-parasites.
tesselated, marked with small squares, e.g., nuts of some Sedges.
thorn, usually an abortive branch petiole or peduncle with a sharp, pointed end.
throat, the upper part of a corolla tube.
thyrsus, a compound inflorescence in which cymes, usually opposite, are arranged in a narrow pyramidal panicle.
tomentose, covered with light-coloured, short, soft and somewhat felted hairs (tomentum).
torulose, cylindrical with small swellings and depressions.
torus, see receptacle.
tree, a plant capable of carrying a single stem, up to about 25 ft. at least.
trigonous, obtusely 3-angled.
triquetrous, more sharply 3-angled, almost 3-winged.
truncate, ending abruptly, as if cut off square.
tuber, a short underground stem containing farinaceous matter, e.g., potato.
tubercled or tuberculate, covered with roundish knobby projections.
tumid, inflated, swollen.
turbinate, top-shaped.
umbel, an inflorescence in which the flowers radiate from a common point on stalks of about the same lengths.
umbellule, a subsidiary umbel in a compound umbel.
umbonate, with a boss as on a shield.
uncinate, hooked.
undershrub, a woody plant less than 3 ft. in height.
undulate, applied to margins of leaves which without being cut out rise and fall like waves.
unguiculate, clawed, applied to a stalked petal.
unisexual, of one sex only, applied to flowers which have stamens and no pistil or vice versa.
urceolate, urn-shaped.
utricle, the pericarp of a nut when it is thin and loose.
valvate, applied to the æstivation of a corolla means that in bud the petals or lobes are arranged edge to edge without overlapping.
valves, these are (a) the segments into which a capsule splits on becoming ripe; (b) the bracts between the glumes and the paleæ (or valvules) in the flowers of Grasses.
valvules (or paleæ), 2-nerved, hyaline bracts situated between the valves (see above) and the lodicules.
ventricose, swelling or inflated.
verrucose, covered by wart-like lumps.
versatile, applied to anthers which are attached by one point on their backs to the tips of the filaments so as to swing loosely.
verticil, whorl.
villous, having long, soft hairs, shaggy.
virgate, twiggy.
viscous or viscid, giving out a sticky secretion.
vittæ, linear vesicles, filled with oil, in the pericarp of Umbelliferæ.
wavy, see undulate, also applied to sinuate.
whorl or verticil, 3 or more leaves or flowers arranged round a stem on the same level.
wing, (a) the prolongation of a fruit or seed into a membrane, (b) a thin membrane along the angle of a stem, (c) protuberances on the rhachilla of certain Sedges.
woolly, with long loose hairs like wool.
GYMNOSPERMÆ (p. 48). Ovules naked, not enclosed in an ovary, no calyx or corolla.
Plants palm-like with fusiform or globose stem; leaves pinnate; flowers in cones.
Cycadaceæ (p. 48).
Whip-like shrub or climber with more or less whorled branches; leaves scale-like, connate at the base, flowers spicate.
Gnetaceæ (p. 48).
ANGIOSPERMÆ. Ovules enclosed in an ovary; calyx or corolla usually present.
Dicotyledones (p. 49). Embryo with 2 seed-leaves (cotyledons). Leaves typically net-veined. Vascular bundles of stem usually in a ring. Flowers mostly with parts in 4’s or 5’s—for key to families of this group see p. 16.
Monocotyledones (p. 365). Embryo with only 1 seed leaf. Leaves typically parallel-nerved. Vascular bundles of the stem scattered. Flowers mostly with parts in 3’s—for key to families of this group see p. 45.
(Extracted and adapted from Hutchinson, Families of Flowering Plants.)
Gynæcium composed of 2 or more separate or nearly quite separate carpels with separate styles and stigmas (rarely the free carpels immersed in the expanded torus (Nymphæaceæ).
“APOCARPÆ”
Petals present free from each other, sometimes considerably modified or scarcely distinguishable from the sepals.
Group 1 (p. 17).
Petals present more or less united
Group 2 (p. 18).
Petals absent
Group 3 (p. 18).
Gynæcium composed of 1 carpel or 2 or more united carpels with free or united styles, or if carpels free below, then the styles or stigmas united.
“SYNCARPÆ”
Ovules attached to the wall or walls of the ovary.
“Parietales”
Ovary superior:
Petals present, free from each other
Group 4 (p. 19).
Petals present, more or less united
Group 5 (p. 22).
Petals absent
Group 6 (p. 24).
Ovary inferior:
Petals present, free from each other
Group 7 (p. 25).
Petals present, more or less united
Group 8(p. 25).
Petals absent
Group 9 (p. 26).
Ovules attached to the central axis, or to the base or apex of the ovary cell.
“Axiles”
Ovary superior:
Petals present, free from each other
Group 10 (p. 26).
Petals present, more or less united
Group 11 (p. 33).
Petals absent
Group 12 (p. 37).
Ovary inferior:
Petals present, free from each other
Group 13 (p. 41).
Petals present, more or less united
Group 14 (p. 43).
Petals absent
Group 15(p. 44).
a) Leaves opposite or verticillate:
b) Stamens numerous, 15 or more; leaves stipulate; fruits follicular or indehiscent, sometimes arranged on a large fleshy torus; style often lateral or basal.
bb) Stamens up to 15 in number:
c) Herbs, often succulent; leaves often connate at the base, exstipulate; flowers mostly cymose; carpels the same number as the petals; seeds often minute, with fleshy endosperm.
cc) Trees, shrubs or woody climbers; carpels 1-3; petals often clawed, thin; stipules mostly intrapetiolar, often connate at the base; sepals often with 2 glands at the base; hairs on the leaves usually medifixed.
Malpighiaceæ
aa) Leaves alternate or all radical:
b) Leaves stipulate:
c) Stamens free from one another or nearly so; fruits follicular or indehiscent, often arranged on a large fleshy torus; sepals imbricate; seeds without endosperm.
cc) Stamens free from one another or nearly so; fruits not on an enlarged torus; trees with large leaves and stellate hairs; calyx valvate; seeds with copious endosperm.
ccc) Stamens more or less united into a column; calyx valvate; mostly trees or shrubs; hairs often stellate or lepidote.
bb) Leaves without stipules:
c) Carpels completely sunk in the tissue of the large broad torus; aquatic plants with floating leaves and bright showy flowers.
cc) Carpels not sunk in the tissue of the torus; not aquatic:
d) Stamens the same number and opposite to the petals; carpels usually 3; leaves simple; fruit drupaceous; endosperm sometimes ruminate.
dd) Stamens alternate with the petals or monadelphous or more numerous than the petals:
e) Stamens numerous (more than 12):
f) Flowers usually hermaphrodite, mostly fairly large and solitary; anthers usually with a broad truncate connective; seeds with abundant ruminate endosperm.
ff) Flowers dioecious, small; anthers with a narrow connective; lateral nerves of the leaves not markedly prominent.
fff) Flowers hermaphrodite, paniculate, small to medium-sized; anthers small, with a narrow connective; lateral nerves of the leaves prominent and parallel; seeds arillate; sepals persistent and often accrescent.
ee) Stamens few (12 or fewer):
f) Leaves compound or very much divided:
g) Herbs; fruit an achene; seed with copious endosperm and small embryo; flowers mostly yellow.
gg) Trees or shrubs; fruit a follicle; seeds without endosperm; leaves pinnate.
ff) Leaves simple:
g) Flowers hermaphrodite; shrubs or trees; seeds arillate, aril entire, more or less cupular; petals 5.
gg) Flowers unisexual; petals and stamens in threes or multiples of three.
Herbs with fleshy opposite leaves; flowers racemose, cymose or paniculate; corolla more or less tubular; calyx sometimes inflated and membranous.
Trees, shrubs or climbers with usually pinnate or unifoliolate leaves; petals very shortly connate at the base; seeds often arillate; calyx never inflated.
a) Trees, shrubs or hard-wooded climbers; leaves simple or rarely compound:
b) Leaves stipulate; stamens free or slightly connate at the base; anthers opening by slits; fruits drupaceous, included by the tubular calyx.
bb) Leaves stipulate; stamens united into a column; anthers in a ring around the top of the column or unequally arranged, opening by slits; hairs often stellate.
aa) Herbs with radical or alternate leaves, or very soft wooded climbers with often opposite leaves and rather broad medullary rays in the wood:
b) Carpels usually numerous, rarely reduced to 1 and then stipulate, often with long hairy tails; sepals induplicate valvate or rarely imbricate, often petaloid; stamens free; leaves sometimes opposite and much divided.
bb) Carpels definite in number, often 3 or 6; flowers unisexual; stamens free or variously connate; climbers with simple leaves.
a) Leaves opposite:
b) Stamens more or less united into 3 or more separate bundles; leaves often gland-dotted or with lines of resin; mostly herbaceous; styles free to the base or very nearly so.
bb) Stamens free or more or less united into not more than 2 separate bundles (diadelphous), sometimes adnate to a gynophore; leaves not or very rarely glandular:
c) Connective of the anthers produced above the cells; flowers often somewhat zygomorphic (irregular), the lower petal often gibbous or saccate at the base.
cc) Connective of the anthers not produced beyond the cells; flowers usually actinomorphic (regular) or papilionaceous:
d) Flowers actinomorphic (regular), sessile; leaves small and ericoid, more or less connate at the base; stamens free.
dd) Flowers zygomorphic (irregular); stamens diadelphous; fruit a legume.
aa) Leaves alternate or all radical:
b) Stamens numerous (more than 12):
c) Filaments more or less connate into a tube or into separate bundles:
d) Filaments connate in 1 or 2 and unequal bundles; leaves compound; flowers mostly arranged in dense spikes or heads.
dd) Filaments connate into more than 2 separate bundles opposite the sepals; calyx valvate; fruits prickly.
cc) Filaments free or at most partially adnate to a gynophore:
d) Ovary supported on a gynophore; petals often clawed; seeds without endosperm.
dd) Ovary sessile or very nearly so:
e) Anthers horse-shoe shaped; ovary placentas 2; ovules numerous; stipules caducous, leaving a wide scar; leaves large, palminerved at the base; pedicels often with 5 large glands below the sepals.
ee) Anthers straight or nearly so, opening by apical pores or short pore-like slits:
f) Seeds hairy; ovary entire; leaves digitately nerved or lobed; stems annual from a woody rhizome with yellow interior.
ff) Seeds not hairy; ovary often deeply lobed, in fruit the carpels becoming nearly free on the enlarged torus; leaves pinnately nerved; stems not annual.
eee) Anthers straight or nearly so, opening by longitudinal slits:
f) Flowers actinomorphic (regular):
g) Leaves stipulate, the stipules sometimes falling off early but leaving a scar:
h) Corona present in the flowers.
hh) Corona absent:
i) Stamens and petals hypogynous:
j) Leaves usually pinnate; wood often with resinous juice.
jj) Leaves simple; wood without resinous juice.
ii) Stamens and petals perigynous.
gg) Leaves without stipules:
h) Trees or shrubs; leaves never lobed.
hh) Herbs with milky juice; stems glaucous; leaves amplexicaul, pinnately lobed or sinuate.
ff) Flowers zygomorphic (irregular):
g) Ovary of 1 carpel; trees or shrubs.
h) Odd petal abaxial; corolla not as below.
hh) Odd petal abaxial; corolla composed of standard, wings and keel.
gg) Ovary of more than 1 carpel; herbs; petals often divided.
bb) Stamens 12 or fewer:
c) Stamens 6, four long and two short (tetradynamous); petals 4, clawed.
cc) Stamens not as above, very rarely 6 and then of equal length; petals rarely 4:
d) Flowers markedly zygomorphic:
e) Fertile stamens sometimes only 2; ovary often on a short or long gynophore.
f) Ovary of more than 1 carpel (i.e., more than 1 placenta).
ff) Ovary of 1 carpel (i.e., only 1 placenta); leaves usually pinnate.
ee) Fertile stamens usually 10 or 8, more than 2:
f) Anthers often with a produced connective; herbs.
ff) Anthers without a produced connective, sometimes with a gland at the apex; habit various, but mostly trees, shrubs or climbers:
g) Odd petal abaxial; corolla composed of standard, wings and keel (papilionaceous); ovary with a single placenta.
gg) Odd petal abaxial; corolla not as above; ovary with a single placenta.
ggg) Odd petal abaxial; ovary with 3 placentas; 5 fertile and 5 barren stamens.
dd) Flowers actinomorphic (regular):
e) Flowers with a distinct corona, sometimes this membranous or represented by a definite ring of hairs towards the base of the calyx tube.
ee) Flowers without a corona:
f) Stamens united, with the anthers in a ring around the apex of the column; endosperm of the seeds often ruminate; mostly weak climbers.
ff) Stamens free or united only at the base or rarely only the anthers connivent:
g) Leaves stipulate; anthers with the connective produced above the cells and often connivent around the style.
gg) Leaves stipulate; anther connective not produced:
h) Staminodes present, sometimes petaloid; stipules often pectinate.
hh) Staminodes absent:
i) Leaves with numerous very sticky glandular hairs, mostly circinnately coiled in bud; seeds not carunculate.
ii) Leaves without sticky hairs, not circinnate in bud; seeds often carunculate or arillate:
j) Styles free to the base.
jj) Styles simple or shortly divided.
ggg) Leaves exstipulate:
h) Herbs; leaves entire or lobed; flowers yellow or orange; seeds pitted, arillate.
hh) Trees, shrubs or climbers:
i) Leaves simple, but sometimes deeply divided:
j) Leaves biglandular at the base.
jj) Leaves not glandular at the base:
k) Leaves digitately lobed.
kk) Leaves not digitately lobed; calyx-tube short; stamens hypogynous.
kkk) Leaves not digitately lobed; calyx-tube rather long; stamens perigynous.
kkkk) Leaves very small and more or less ericoid; flowers in slender spikes or racemes:
ii) Leaves compound:
j) Flowers in heads or dense spikes; petals valvate; ovary of 1 carpel; ovules more than 1.
jj) Flowers not in heads or dense spikes; ovary usually of more than one carpel; ovule solitary.
jjj) Flowers racemose; ovary of 5 carpels with numerous ovules.
a) Stamens free from the corolla-tube:
b) Ovary composed of more than one carpel:
c) Stamens numerous, more than twice the number of the corolla lobes; anthers opening by longitudinal slits with broadened truncate connective; seeds with copious ruminate endosperm; shrubs, trees or climbers with exstipulate simple leaves.
cc) Stamens 5-12; anthers not appendaged at the apex, usually opening by longitudinal slits, rarely by pores; leaves alternate, exstipulate; erect trees or shrubs:
d) Leaves fairly large; flowers more or less corymbose; stamens 5.
dd) Leaves very small and scale-like; flowers in slender spikes or racemes; stamens 5-10.
bb) Ovary composed of a single carpel (usually a legume); stamens free or more usually diadelphous or monadelphous, often 10, rarely numerous:
c) Stamens connate into a sheath or free; flowers usually hermaphrodite:
d) Flowers actinomorphic (regular); petals valvate; calyx gamosepalous or valvate; leaves usually bipinnate, rarely simply pinnate; flowers often collected into heads.
dd) Flowers zygomorphic (irregular) or rarely actinomorphic; sepals imbricate or rarely valvate; petals imbricate, the upper (adaxial) one inside the others; leaves often pinnate or bipinnate.
ddd) Flowers zygomorphic; petals imbricate, the upper (adaxial) one (the standard) outside the others, the lateral two (the wings) outside the abaxial pair (the keel) which are more or less united along their lower edges; leaves simple, digitate or simply pinnate.
cc) Stamens connate into a column with the anthers in a ring at the top; flowers dioecious; fruit a drupe; slender climbers.
aa) Stamens inserted on the corolla-tube, sometimes near the base:
b) Stamens double the number of the petals, usually diadelphous; flower sometimes zygomorphic:
c) Flowers zygomorphic (irregular), often somewhat papilionaceous, hermaphrodite; seeds often hairy; leaves small to medium-sized.
cc) Flowers actinomorphic (regular), unisexual or polygamous; seeds with a succulent coat; leaves large, palmately lobed.
bb) Stamens the same number as the corolla lobes; corolla actinomorphic or nearly so:
c) Leaves opposite:
d) Carpels 2, more or less free; pollen granular, no corona in the corolla; mostly shrubs, trees or climbers.
dd) Carpels 2, free; styles separate up to the common thickened apex; pollen agglutinated into masses; corolla with a corona; mostly herbs or twiners.
ddd) Carpels 2, connate into a 1 or 2 celled ovary; pollen not agglutinated; one common style present:
e) Stamens 5; ovules numerous; herbs; corolla actinomorphic.
ee) Stamens 4; ovules 1-2 in each cell; habit various; corolla usually zygomorphic.
cc) Leaves alternate or radical; marsh or aquatic herbs:
d) Corolla lobes imbricate or contorted; styles 2, free or partly united.
dd) Corolla lobes induplicate valvate; style 1, with 1-2 stigmas.
bbb) Stamens fewer than the corolla lobes, 4 or 2; corolla zygomorphic or rarely subactinomorphic:
c) Leafless parasites (on roots) never green herbs; seeds minute, very numerous, with endosperm.
cc) Leafy and not or rarely parasitic:
d) Ovules numerous on each placenta; mostly trees; seeds transverse, winged.
dd) Ovules 1-2 on each placenta; stem and branches often 4-sided.