eusporangiate |
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reproduction |
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Having relatively large sporangia each of which develops from a group of initial cells that, by periclinal divisions, give rise to an outer layer of primary cells and an inner layer of sporogenous cells; in Psilotophyta, Lycopodiophyta, Equisetophyta, and some Polypodiophyta. |
archegonium pl. archegonia |
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STRUCTURE |
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A female gametangium; a multicellular fertile organ of a mature gametophyte within which female gametes (eggs, ova) are produced and fertilized; having a broad, bulbous base and a narrower distal neck. Technically present but highly reduced and of no descriptive significance in Magnoliophyta. |
gynoecium pl. gynoecia var. gynaecium |
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STRUCTURE |
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The pistil(s) of a single flower together with any ontogenetically equivalent or subordinate structures present, taken collectively; the total female (ovule-producing) structural complement of a single flower. It may include one to many pistils, each simple or compound. |
ringed |
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relief |
bark |
Fissured, mainly horizontally, with at least some of the fissures individually encircling the stem more or less completely. |
leaf-opposed |
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insertion |
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Nodal and directly opposite the leaf. |
pliestesial |
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duration |
plant |
Perennial and monocarpic, living several to many years before reproducing sexually, dying promptly thereafter. |
oblate |
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plane shape |
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Symmetrically elongate and broader than long perpendicular to the developmental or polar axis. |
deciduous 2 |
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habit |
plant |
Perennial and having all leaves separating and falling away during a particular portion of the yearly cycle, especially the autumn or the dry season, between growing seasons. Semantically, this term is properly applied only to the entity that falls, not to the structure that it separates and falls from; in traditional usage, though, the term has been applied to trees and other perennial plants that shed all their leaves at some time during the yearly cycle. |
circumscissile |
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dehiscence |
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Splitting transversely through the exterior wall about its entire circumference, the resulting upper cap-like portion falling away. |
diaphragmed |
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architecture |
pith |
Uninterrupted by cavities but heterogeneous in texture at axis maturity, with sectors of spongy tissue separated by relatively thin transverse plates of denser tissue that occur at the nodes or are otherwise regularly spaced along the axis. |
pachycaulous |
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architecture |
plant |
Having thick, more or less succulent stems. |
seed |
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STRUCTURE |
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A mature or ripened ovule containing an embryonic sporophyte and a nutritive tissue (endosperm or perisperm) with stored food that sustains the initial growth of the embryo upon germination, except when such food reserve is stored instead in the cotyledon(s) of the embryo itself, these enclosed by one or two integuments (the testa), the whole serving as a propagule. A fertile seed (one containing a viable embryo) normally results from sexual fertilization of an egg by a sperm; however, fertile seeds are sometimes produced asexually by apomictic processes (e.g., parthenogenesis). |
acrocaulous |
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insertion |
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At or very near the stem tip. |
pseudostem |
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STRUCTURE |
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A structure that resembles a stem but is not part of the axial system of a shoot, lacking anatomical differentiation into nodes and internodes. |
straight |
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course |
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Lacking significant curves or bends. |
collateral |
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insertion |
buds |
In pairs within or immediately straddling the leaf axils, the members of a pair lateral to one another. |
incurved |
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orientation |
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Curving adaxially. See also decurved. |
dovetailing |
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habit |
trichome |
Papillate and serving to hold a surface to the opposing one of an appressed structure by interlocking with others on the opposing surface; sometimes furcate. |
free |
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fusion |
dissimilar structure(s) |
Not fused with or joined to any other dissimilar structure(s). |
pyxis pl. pyxides |
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nominative |
fruit |
Like a capsule but circumscissile, the one or more seeds being released from the locule(s) upon separation of the distal, cap-like portion of the pericarp. See also diplotegium. |
subpetiolar |
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insertion |
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Just below the point of petiole insertion. |
intercostal |
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position |
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Between the costae. |
peloric |
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architecture |
corolla |
Regular when the usual condition in the taxon is irregular. |
valvate 3 |
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dehiscence |
anther |
Poricidal with the pores formed by the raising of small flaps (valves) in the exterior wall. |
androgynecandrous |
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reproduction |
taxon |
Monoecious, each inflorescence having distal and proximal sectors with only staminate flowers and between them a central sector with only pistillate ones. |