Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Trees or shrubs, pubescent with simple or glandular hairs.

Stems:

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Alternate or sometimes opposite. Pinnately veined. Petiolate. Stipules persistent or caducous.

Flowers: Flowers in racemes, panicles, or cymes. Flowers bisexual (perfect) or rarely unisexual, actinomorphic. Calyx of (3)4–5(–11) sepals; sepals distinct or connate at base, valvate or sometimes imbricate. Corolla of (0,3)4–5 petals; petals distinct or rarely connate at base, often fringed at apex. Stamens numerous, distinct, often weakly grouped into 5 clusters opposite the sepals, inserted on a disk or enlarged receptacle that is ± elongated to form an androgynophore; anthers dithecal, opening by transverse apical slits or pores, sometimes by longitudinal lateral slits. Ovary superior, (1)2-carpellate to many-carpellate, with as many cells, placentation axile; ovules 2 to numerous per cell, anatropous; style simple or short-lobed.

Fruit: Capsules occasionally drupaceous; a spinose. Seeds with copious oily and proteinaceous endosperm; sometimes with an aril.

Ploidy:

Habitat:

Elevation Range: