Description

Key Characters:

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

Stems: Stems 1–2 dm long, many-branched, a central stem usually not obvious past the first internode, all stems basically arising distichously, similar in width, stems cylindrical for 2(3) internodes, otherwise flattened throughout, second internode cylindrical, 10–13 mm long, 2–4mm wide, other internodes usually 7–15(–22) mm long, 2–4(–5) mm wide, the nerves indistinct.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple Opposite distichous, reduced and fused into a ring. strongly reduced Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers confined to the axils flowers in clusters in the leaf 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: In diverse mesic forest.

Elevation Range: ca. 300 m.