Salix brachycarpa : Short Capsuled Willow

Scientific Name:

Kingdom: Plantae

Division:

• Tracheophyta (vascular)
• Spermatophyta (seed bearing)
Angiospermae (enclosed seed)

Class: Dicoteldonae (two seed-leaves)

Family: Salicaceae (Willow Family)

Genera: Salix (Willows) (Classic Latin name for willow)

Species: brachycarpa

Synonym(s): S.niphoclada, S.glauca ssp. niphoclada

English Name(s):

Short Capsuled Willow,

First Nation Names:

K'aii

Structure:

• Low upright and freely branching shrub.
• Often less than 1m high.
• Branches reddish brown, pubescent (hiary).
• Branchlets densely white or gray villous-lanate (wooly).

Leaves:

• Alternate.
• Buds of all salix spp. (Willows) are covered by a single scale.
• Obovate in shape.
• 2-3cm long by 0.7-1.0cm wide.
• Margins entire (smooth).
• Lower surface densely gray-hirsute (spreading hairs). Upper surface less so. Becoming glabrescent (hairless) in age.
• Petioles (stalks) 0.5-3.0mm long, often reddish.

Reproductive Parts:

• Flowers lacking a parianth(sepals + petals). Born in cylindrical catkins.
• Plants dioecious (uni-sexual).
• Catkins appearing with leaves on short leafy peduncles (stalks).
• Pistillate catkins (female) short, often 1-2cm long, narrowly cylindrical, loosely flowered.
• Pistils densely white lanate (wooly).
• Styles very short 0.2-0.5mm long.
• Nectaries about half as long as the pistil.
• Bracts elliptic in shape, light brown.

Seed:

• Fruit a dehiscent (splitting open) capsule containing numerous small seeds.
• Seed capsules crowded, 5-6mm long, gray-wooly, sessile (no stalk) or with stipe (stalk) very short.

Not to Be Confused With:

• Many of the erect shrub Salix (Willow) species can be hard to distinguish from each other. Useing the Keys and especially the Character Chart Key on the Salicaceae (Willow Family) Page should help.

Physiology:

• Are insect pollenated. Both male and female flowers have nectaries to attract pollenating insects. Male pollen is also brightly coloured red or yellow to attract insects.
• Several types of galls can be seen on willows. These are deformations of plant tissue caused by the physical actions or chemical secretions of insects.
• Willow Roses are a type of gall that grows on some species of willow. It is caused by the larvae of Cecidomyia rosaria. The larvae through chemical secretions cause the leaves of the bud to grow in a rose petal like fashion.

Life Cycle:

• Perennial.

Seasonal Cycle:

• Leaves and catkins deciduous.
• Catkins appearing with the leaves.

Animal Uses:

• In spring and early summer the catkins and young leaves are eagerly eaten by many mammals and birds.
• Moose, caribou and deer all eat the twigs and young branches.
• The twigs and bark are eaten by hares and lemmings.
• Willow is an important food for bears and a secondary food for beavers.
• Willow is an important food for many animals.
• Winter buds are one of the principle winter foods of ptarmigan and grouse.

Habitat:

• On calcareous soils. Forming low thickets near top of limestone screes.
• Arctic tundra, sandy blowouts, and on dry alpine slopes.

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