Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Brittle, hemiparasitic, producing haustoria that penetrate the host.

Stems: Stems 1–3(–5) dm long, strongly jointed, usually several times branched, secondary and tertiary branches conspicuously narrower than main stem, arising distichously or obliquely, the main stem cylindrical for 1(2) internodes, abruptly flattened from the third node onward, second internode usually cylindrical, sometimes flattened, 15–25 mm long, (3–)4–8(–17) mm wide, the internodes rectangular or rarely obovate to narrowly obovate, 10–45 mm long, 6–25 mm wide, usually 1–5–nerved, rarely more.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple Opposite and distichous. strongly reduced Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers confined to the axils, surrounded by a patch of usually dark hairs, the flower groups becoming many–flowered through later development of collateral and serial adventitious buds, sometimes forming a continuous band around the stem, all clusters with staminate and pistillate flowers intermingled. Flowers unisexual, minute, actinomorphic, each flower subtended by a small bract. Calyx (sepals) absent. Corolla of pistillate flowers 3-lobed, the lobes short, triangular, valvate. Staminate flowers globose in bud, later with 3 triangular segments, Stamens connate into a globose synandrium, 6 celled; anthers opening by slits toward the center of the synandrium. Pollen ultimately pouring out from a single central, apical pore. Ovary inferior (pistillate flowers), clavate or pear–shaped in bud, 3–4-carpellate, 1-celled; style terminal; stigma nipple–shaped, the embryo sacs first growing downward, then curving upward in the ovary wall, eventually U–shaped.

Fruit: Berries with persistent corolla; fleshy; glossy. Seeds 1 per fruit; flattened in the upper portion; seed coat absent; endosperm starchy; chlorophyllose.

Ploidy:

Habitat: Most common in wet and mesic forest.

Elevation Range: (100–)600–1,350(–2,140) m.