A
- Achene (pl.Achenes)
- A small dry indehiscent (not opening) fruit
- Distinguished from a nutlet by its relatively thin wall.
- Acute
- Forming an acute (less than 90 degrees) angle a the base or tip.
- Alternate
- Born singly, 1 per node, not in pairs or tufts.
- As opposed to Opposite
Picture: leaves alternate on the stem Salix candida
- Annual
- A plant that lives for only one year. completes life-cycle in one year.
- Attenuate
- Gradually tapering to a very slender point.
- Axil (pl. Axils)
- The upper angle where a leaf or other part branches from the stem.
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B
- Basal
- Originating from the base of plant.
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- Biennial
- A plant that lives for 2 years. Takes 2 years to complete life cycle. Ussually growing vegitative parts first year and reproductive parts the second.
- Bract (pl. Bracts)
- A small leaf or leaf like structure at base of flower, or axils of leaves, or on stem.
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- Bracteoles
- Often denoting a small bract.
- Better applied to small bract-like organs arising laterally on the flower pedicel (stalk).
- Bulb (pl. Bulbs )
- A short, vertical, thickened, underground bud for food storage or reproduction with thickened fleashy scales or leaves. As in an Onion.
- compare to corm
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- Bulbil (pl. bulbils )
- Small bulbous growth ussually arising from a larger bulb or the leaf axils. Capable when separated of producing a new plant. Can be a vegitative form or reproduction.
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C
- Cadocous
- Falling very early.
- Caspitose
- Growing in dence tufts; usually applied only to plants of small size.
- Calcareous
- Of or containing calcium carbonate. ex. Limestone
- Capsule (pl. Capsules)
- A dry fruit composed of more than one carpel (chamber) that opens at maturity to release the seed(s).
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- Catkin (pl. catkins )
- A dense infloresence ussually raceme or spike of many small, naked, non-petaled, unisexual flowers.
Picture: Catkins illustration
- Caudex
- The thickened base of a perennial plant.
- Chlorophyll
- The green pigment of plants responsible for photosynthesis.
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- Coetenaceous
- Indicating that flowers and leaves appear at the same time.
- As opposed to precocious
- Column
- In Orchid Family refers to the united filaments and style.
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- Compound
- Leaves separated into more than one blades or leaflets.
- Corm (pl. Corms)
- A short solid underground stem with or without scaley leaves. Used by plant for food storage or reproduction.
- Compare to bulb
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D
- Deciduous
- Falling off; Dieing back; Not evergreen; Not peresistent.
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- Decumbent
- Prostrate at base, erect or ascending elsewhere.
-
- Dehiscent
- Opening at maturity
- As opposed to indehiscent
- Dioecious
- Plants of the species are either male of female not both.
- As opposed to monoecious
- Drupe
- A fleashy indehiscent (not opening) fruit with a stony endocarp (center) surounding a single seed.
- Drupelet
- A drupelet is a small drupe that is usuualy part of a larger fruit.
- Ex. Raspberries are made up of numerous drupelets.
E
- Elater (pl. elaters)
- Structures attached to some spores to aid in dispersal.
Picture: Spores with elaters of Equisetum.sps
- Endophytic
- Growing within another plants tussue.
- Epiphytic
- Growing on another plant but not parasiting it(not drawing food or water from it).
- Compare parasite
F
- Filiform
- Threadlike.
- Flexuous
- Curved alternately in opposite directions.
- Floccose
- Irregularily covered by tufts or flocks of soft hair or wool.
- Follicle
- A dry dehiscent fruit developed from a single pistle and opening usually along one side only.
- Frond
- The often many parted leaf of a fern.
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G
- Gametophyte
- The haploid (1n) plant or generation that will produce the gametes (female megapores (egg), or male microspores (sperm)).
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Picture: In the Bryophytes the Gametophyte is the dominant generation G.species
- Glabrous
- Smooth, hairless.
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- Glaucous
- Covered with a blueish, grayish or whiteish waxy coating.
H
- Herbacious
- Stems dieing back to ground at end of growing season.
- As opposed to ligneous (woody).
- Hirsute
- Pubescent with spreading hairs.
- Hispid
- Pubescent with stiff spreading hairs.
- Hoary
- Grayish white, close pubescence (hairyness).
- Hypanthium
- An expantion of the recepticle (bottom of flower) forming a saucer-shaped, cup-shaped or tubular organ, often simulating a calyx (sepal) tube and bearing the sepals, petals and often the stamens (male parts) at of near its margin.
-
I
- Imperfect
- A flower that has either male or female parts but not both.
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- Indehiscent
- A fruit that does not open at maturity along definite lines or pores.
- As opposed to dehiscent
- Indument
- The epidermal appendages of a plant or organ considered collectively, such as its pubescents (hairyness).
- Inferior (Inferior Ovary)
- Reffering to an ovary that is attached to the receptacle (flower base) below the parianth (sepals + patels).
- As opposed to superior ovary
- Inflorescence
- A complete flower cluster including the axis and bracts.
- Inducium (pl. Inducia)
- A thin outgrowth of a fern leaf, covering a sorus. Often hoodlike.
Picture: Thread like inducia of W.Glabella
- Involute
- Rolled upwards.
- As opposed to revolute
- Involucrum (syn. Involucre)
- A set of bracts closely associated with each other and subtending (below) an inflorescence.
J
- Joint
- The section of a stem where the leaf or branch arrises.
- Used in some families to describe the nodes.
K
- Keel (Keeled)
- The two lower united petals in the Apiaceae (Leguminosae).
- A prominent longitudinal ridge; like the keel of a boat.
L
- Laciniate
- Deeply cut into narrow segments.
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- Layering
- A form of vegitative reproduction for some conifer trees. The lowest branches touching the grow will root and an erect stem will sprout up.
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- Lenticel (pl.Lenticels)
- A slightly raised, somewhat corky, often lence shaped area on a stem.
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- Ligneous
- Woody
- As opposed to herbaceous.
- Locule
- The chamber or cell of an organ. Usually referring to the chambers of an ovary.
M
- Marcescent
- Withering and persistent (not falling).
- Megaspore (pl. Megaspores)
- Female spore will give rise to female gametophyte.
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- Microspore (pl. Microspores)
- Male spore will give rise to male gametophyte.
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- Monoecious
- Plants of the species are bisexual.
- As opposed to dioecious
- Mycorrhiza (pl. Mycorrhizae)
- The symobiotic relationship between a plants roots and fungi.
N
- Nectary
- A gland that secretes nectar, usually on the disk or corolla or in the spur of the flower.
- in Salix (Willow) a small protuberance a the base of the pistillate flower stalk.
- Nerve (#-Nerved)
- A prominent, longitudnal, simple, vein or rib a leaf petal of other organ.
- Often used as a suffex, eg. 1-nerved, three-nerved.
- Node (Nodes)
- A point on the stem from which leaves or branches arise.
- Charactarized internally by certain anatomical features.
- Nutlet (pl.Nutlets)
- A small nut. One of the sections or lobes of the mature ovary.
- Distinguished from an achene by the thickness of its wall.
O
- Oblong
- Describes a flat organ broader than linear and maintaining its width for most of its lenght.
- Also describing a solid object, such as a fruit or seed, which is essentially cylindric and so appears oblong from the side.
- Obtuse
- Blunt.
- Opposite
- Born across from one another at the same node.
- As opposed to alternate
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P
- Parasitic (n. Parasite)
- Gaining food and water either wholely or partially from another plant.
- Compare epiphyte
- Pedicel
- A stalk of a single flower in an inflorescence.
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- Peduncle
- The stalk of a flower, flower raceme or strobili.
Picture: Peduncles of E.sylvaclatum
- Perennial
- A plant that lives 3 or more years. As opposed to Biennial and Annual.
- Petiole
- A leaf stalk.
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- Phloem
- The food conducting tissue of vascular plants.
- In woody plants it is the inner-bark tissue.
- See xylem
- Pilose
- Rather sparsely beset with straight spreading hairs.
- Pinnate
- A compound leaf with leaflets, or lobes arranged on two sides of an axis. See leaf shapes diagram.
- Perfect
- A Flower with both male and female parts.
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- Perianth
- Petals + sepals = perianth. See flower parts diagram.
- Pistil
- Female reproductive part of a flower. Consisting of stigma, style and ovary.
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- Pome
- A fleashy fruit derived from an inferior compound ovary.
- Examples: apples and Rose hips.
- Precocious
- Indicating that in the spring, the flowers appear before the leaves.
- As opposed to Coetenaceous
- Pubescent
- Covered in short soft hairs.
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Q
- Quill (Quilled)
- With tubular florets (mini-flowers), especially in cases where the flowers are typically ligulate (strap shaped), as in some members of the Asteraceae (Compositaceae).
- Quinate
- 5-parted. As in a leaf with 5 leaflets.
- Synonym: 5-pinnate.
R
- Rachis
- The central portion of a compound organ bearing its seperate divisions laterally in one or two rows, as the rachis of a compound leaf.
- To be distinguished from axis, which bears the divisions radially.
- The two terms are often used loosely and interchangeably.
- Reflexed
- Bend backwards or downwards.
- Rhizome
- An underground horizontal stem or rootstock.
Pictures: 2types of rhizomes
- Revolute
- Rolled toward the underside of the leaf
- As opposed to involute
- Rugose
- Describing a wrinkled surface.
- In leaves usually depressed along the viens and vienlets and elevated between them.
S
- Saporphytic (n. Saporphyte)
- A plant living on dead organic matter. Does not have chlorophyll so cannot produce its own food.
- Compare parasitic
- Scarious
- Thin, membranous, and dry.
- Scape (adj. Scapose)
- A leafless flower stalk arising from the ground.
- Sericeous
- Silky from the presence of numerous soft appressed or ascending hairs.
- Sessile
- attached directly, without a supporting stalk.
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- Sporangium (pl. Sporangia)
- The spore bearing case or sac. Of many forms depending on species.
Picture: 4 sori of rounded Sporangia of W.Glabella
- Spore (pl. spores)
- A haploid (1n) cell which will grow into the Gametophyte.
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- Spur
- 1:A hollow, slender apendage of a petal or sepal or of the calyx or corolla
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- 2:A short shoot bearing leaves or flowers and fruits.
- Sorus (pl. Sori)
- A cluster of sporangia on a fern leaf.
Picture: 4 Sori of rounded sporangia of W.Glabella
- Stamen (pl. stamens, stamina)
- Male reproductive part of a flower. Composed of an anther and filiment.
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- Stipules
- A pair of leaf-like appendages found at the base of the petiole (leaf stalk).
- Stipe
- The stalk attaching the ovary to the recepticle (where the other flower parts arise) in some flowers.
- Stolon (Adj. Stoloniform)
- An elongate horizontal branch arising at or near the base of the plant and creeping along the ground rooting at the nodes or at the tip and giving rise to a new plant.
- Stoloniferous = bearing stolons.
- Strobili
- A cone like structure containing the spore producing organs (sproangia).
Picture: Strobili of L.clavatum
- Style (pl. styles )
- The narrow portion of the pistil connecting the stigma to the ovary.
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- Subligneous
- Almost woody
- Sucker
- A shoot originating from a root or stem below ground.
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- Superior (Superior Ovary)
- Reffering to an ovary that is attached to the receptacle (flower base) above the parianth (sepals + patels).
- As opposed to Inferior ovary
T
- Thallus (pl. Thalli)
- A plant body not clearly differentiated into root, stem and leaf.
Picture: Typical thalus of a fern
- Tomentum (Adj. Tomentose)
- Woolly, with short, crooked matted hairs.
- Trichome
- A hairlike outgrowth of the epidermis.
- Turion
- A scaly, often thick and fleshy, shoot produced from a bud usually on an underground rootstalk.
U
- Umbel (pl. Umbels )
- A type of inflorescence where pedicile arise from a common point. Umbrella like. see inflroescence diagram.
V
- Villous (Alt. Villose)
- Covered with long, soft, shaggy but unmatted hairs.
W
- Whorled
- To be arranged in whorles or circles around a stem or from a node.
Picture: Whorled branches of E.sylvaclatum.
- Winter bud
- A shortened and crowded, hibernating vegitative shoot.
- Woody
- Stems persistant not deciduous. As opposed to Herbacious. Also called lignious.
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X
- Xylem
- The water conducting tissue of vascular plants.
- See phloem
Z
- Zygomorphic
- Bilaterally symetrical; the upper half unlike the lower, the left half a mirror of the right.
- The type of symetry exhbited in most irregular flowers.
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