Home to the plants of the Sonoran, Chihuahuan and Mojave Deserts
Glossary
The botanical glossary used in Southwest Desert Flora is an alphabetical list of words or terms relevant to the descriptions here. In addition to the more difficult or unusual words defined here the glossary also provides definitions to some of the more common day-to-day botanical words that are not necessarily understood by all readers. This glossary is regularly updated or modified.
An adjective descriptive of a plant that has no apparent stem, or at least none visible above ground. Examples include some species of Agave, Oxalis and Attalea.
Generally a cypsela is formed from an inferior ovary and may have a pappus, and an achene is formed from an superior ovary and does not have a pappus attached.
Regular; radially symmetrical; may be bisected into similar halves in at least two planes. Applies e.g. to steles and flowers in which the perianth segments within each whorl are alike in size and shape; compare Regular; contrast with Asymmetrical, Irregular, Zygomorphic.
Alkaline or alkali, soils are clay soils with high pH (> 8.5), a poor soil structure and a low infiltration capacity. Often having a hard 'pan' or hard calcareous layers from 1½ feet or deeper.
A fan or cone-shaped deposit of granular fertile soil deposited by streams or other drainage from mountainous terrain. The formation of one or more alluvial fans into a single fan against a slope is called a bajada (see Bajada).
Leaves or flowers borne singly at different levels along a stem includes spiralled parts; or (as preposition) when something occurs between something else, for example stamens alternating with petals; compare Opposite
1. (of a flower) the period during which pollen is presented and/or the stigma is receptive.
2. (of a flowering plant) the period during which flowers in anthesis are present. note: not defined for some cases, such as when pollen is released in the bud.
A region is arid when it is characterized by a severe lack of available water, to the extent of hindering or preventing the growth and development of plant and animal life
Having a pleasant, noticeable, distinctive or strong smell.
Arroyo
Also called a wash, is a dry creek, stream bed or gulch that temporarily or seasonally fills and flows after sufficient rain. Flash floods are common in arroyos following thunderstorms.
A plant that bears berries is said to be bacciferous or baccate (a fruit that resembles a berry, whether it actually is a berry or not, can also be called "baccate".
An alluvial fan of deposits of sediment by a stream settling onto flats at the front of a mountain. Derived from the Spanish word bajada; meaning with a sense of “descent” or “inclination” (see Alluvial fan).
Plant which completes its life cycle and dies within the second year; usually also forms a basal rosette of leaves the first year and flowers and fruits the second year.
John Milton Bigelow, (1804-1878), American physician and botanist; Dr. Bigelovii was a professor of botany who collected in the western United States under Joseph Whipple Congdon in the Pacific Railroad Survey of 1853-1854. In addition, he worked with 3 top American botanists of the day, John Torrey, Asa Gray, and George Engelmann; and had a significant collection of California plants that yielded many new species.
Plant flowers bearing both male and female reproductive organs; usually, flowers with both stamens and carpels; hermaphrodite. See Perfect.
Blade
The lamina or flattened part of a leaf, excluding the stalk.
Bloom
A fine white or bluish waxy powder occurring on plant parts, usually stems, leaves and fruits. It is easily removed by rubbing.
Bosque
A type of gallery forest habitat found along the riparian flood plains of stream and river banks in the southwestern United States. It derives its name from the Spanish word for ‘woodlands’.
Bract
Modified leaf associated with flower or inflorescence, differing in shape, size or color from other leaves (and without an axillary bud).
Bracteole (Small bracts borne singly or in pairs on the pedicel or calyx. The state of having bracts is referred to as bracteate or bracteolate. Also see bract.
Bramble
1. A prickly shrub of the genus Rubus of the rose family, including the blackberry and the raspberry.
2. A prickly shrub or bush.
Bristle
Straight stiff hair (smooth or with minute teeth).
Browse
(Re; herbivorous animals, generally, a reference to herbivores that feed off of the ground and mainly eat leaves, fruits, soft shoots and twigs of high growing trees and shrubs; compare Graze
Bulb
(adj. bulbiferous), thick storage organ, usually underground, consisting of a stem and leaf bases (the inner ones fleshy).
Bur or Burr
Loosely, a prickly fruit; a rough or prickly propagule consisting of a seed or fruit and associated floral parts or bracts.
Falling off early, for example the sepals of poppies, that fall off when the petals begin to open; compare Persistent and Fugacious.
Caespitose
A tufted form or growth; e.g. the growth form of some grasses, growing in tufts.
Calcareous
A soil type rich in calcium carbonate (CaCO3). Southwestern calcareous soils contain heavy amounts of limestone and lime. (see Caliche and Limestone.
Caliche
A hardened natural cement of calcium carbonate (CaCO3) that binds other materials—such as gravel, sand, clay, and silt. It is generally light-colored and occurs in arid or semi-arid regions in the Sonoran and Mojave Deserts. The term caliche is Spanish originally from the Latin calx, meaning lime. see Calcareous and Limestone.
Calyculus
(adj. calyculate) (calyculi)
(1) a cup-shaped structure formed from bracts;
(2) in some Asteraceae, an extra set of bracts or phyllaries just below the involucre simulating a calyx; an involucel.
Calyx
(Plural calyces) the outer whorl of a flower, usually green; the sepals of one flower collectively.
Calyx tube
A tube formed by the fusion of the sepals (calyx), at least at the base.
Campanulate
Bell-shaped.
Canescent
Approaching white in color, covered with dense white (or grayish-white tricomes) down or wool.
Capitulum
A dense cluster of sessile, or almost sessile, flowers or florets; a head.
Capsule
A dry fruit formed from two of more united carpels and dehiscing when ripe (usually by splitting into pieces or opening at summit by teeth or pores).
Count Alexandre Henri Gabriel de Cassini, (1781–1832), was a French botanist and naturalist, who specialized in Asteraceae, the sunflower family which was known as family Compositae at the time.
Catkin
A spike, usually pendulous, in which the mostly small flowers are unisexual and without a conspicuous perianth; e.g. willows, poplars, oaks and casuarinas. The individual flowers often have scaly bracts; they are generally wind-pollinated. The catkins are usually shed as a unit.
Caudex (plural: caudices)
Literally the stem of a plant, but also used to mean a rootstock, or particularly a basal stem structure or storage organ from which new growth arises. See also Connate
Caudiciform
Literally meaning "stem-like" or "caudex-like", is sometimes used to mean "pachycaul", meaning "thick-stemmed". See also Caudex
Caulescent
Having a leafy stem above ground, as contrasted with Acaulescent and Scapose.
Cauline
Borne on an aerial stem, e.g. leaves, flower or fruits (when applied to the latter two organs, usually referring to older stems.
Chaparral Vegetation
A thicket of dense growth of low growing, mostly small-leaved evergreen shrubs and thorny bushes and brambles.
Chasmogamous
Of flowers that are pollinated when the perianth is open. see Cleistogamous.
Cilia
(singular cilium, adjective ciliate) Generally, hairs more or less confined to the margins of an organ, like eye-lashes; in motile cells, minute, hair-like protrusions which aid motility.
Circinate
(Botany) Used of leaves or similar parts that are coiled on themselves from the apex toward their base.
Circumscissile
Describing any seed-vessel that splits along a circumference, with the upper part coming off as a lid.
Clambering
A plant growing more or less erect by leaning or twining on another structure for support, or by clinging with tendrils.
Clasping
A leaf without a petiole and whose base partially or completely surrounds a stem.
Claw
Narrow, stalk-like basal portion of petal, sepal of bract.
Cleft
Deeply cut about halfway to the midrib, as in many leaves and petals.
Cleistogamous
Of flowers that self-pollinate and never open fully, or self-pollinate before opening; see Chasmogamous.
A fruit, usually woody, ovoid to globular, including scales, bracts or bracteoles arranged around a central axis, e.g. in gymnosperms, especially conifers and Casuarina.
Conifers are gymnosperms, non-flowering plants; cone-bearing seed plants; woody, mostly trees, some shrubs. Today, all living conifers belong to the order Pinales within the Pinopyta Division.
Dr. James Graham Cooper, (1830-1902), was a geologist of the Geological Survey of California, who collected plants in the Mojave Desert in 1861. He was the son of William Cooper, one of the founders of the New York City Museum of Natural History.
Fleshy, swollen stem base, usually underground, storing food reserves, with buds naked or covered by very thin scales; a type of rootstock. Adjectives derived from "corm" include "cormose" and "cormous";.
(adjective: coronate) literally, crown
1. in flowering plants, ring of structures that may be united in a tube, arising from the corolla or perianth of a flower and standing between the perianth lobes and the stamens. The trumpet of a daffodil is a corona.
2. in grasses, a hardened ring of tissue surmounting the lemma in some species.
Corymb (Adjective corymbose) an inflorescence with the flowers growing in such a fashion that the outermost are borne on longer pedicels than the inner, bringing all flowers up to a common level. A corymb has a flattish top superficially resembling an umbel, and may have a branching structure similar to a panicle. Flowers in a corymb structure can either be parallel, or alternate, and form in either a convex, or flat form.
Elliot Coues was a naturalist and ornithologist. As an ornithologist he published Birds of the Northwest (1874) and Birds of the Colorado Valley (1878). The Coues White-tailed Deer was also named in his honor.
John Thomas Coulter, (1793-1843) Irish botanist, physician and explorer. Dr. Coulter studied botany in Switzerland under Augustin de Candolle, discovered the Colorado Desert and was first to collect the Matilija Poppy among other plants. John Thomas Coulter was the first botanist to collect in Arizona. Not to be confused with John Merle Coulter, (1851-1928), also a botanist who was recognized with Erigeron coulteri.
Crenate
Leaf or fruit with blunt, rounded teeth or scalloped margin.
In grasses, sedges, rushes, and some other monocotyledons, an aerial stem bearing the inflorescence; strictly, from the base of the plant to the lowest involucral bract (or base of the inflorescence).
The term cultivar is derived from cultivated variety and denotes an assemblage of cultivated plants clearly distinguished by one or more characters (morphological, physiological, cytological, chemical or other); when reproduced (sexually or asexually), the assemblage retains its distinguishing characters. A cultivar may arise in cultivation or be introduced from the wild. It is a variant of horticultural interest or value. Cultivar names are written with single quotation marks around them e.g. 'Blue Carpet', 'Alba'. All new names established after 1 January 1959, must be in common language (that is, not in Latin) but names established in Latin prior to this date are retained in Latin form.
(Adjective cymose) Inflorescence in which the main axis (central stem) and all lateral branches end in a flower, terminal flower develops first (each lateral may be repeatedly branched. see Thyrse
A dry, indehiscent, one-seeded fruit formed from an inferior ovary. see Achene
Cypsela or Achene?
Basically a cypsela is formed from an inferior ovary and may have a pappus, and an achene is formed from an superior ovary and does not have a pappus attached.
Samuel Dale, (1659-1739) was an English physician, apothecary, botanist, botanical collector, and gardener. Samuel Dale was the author of several botanical works and a treatise on medicinal plants.
Divided to more than one level, as in bipinnate leaves for example, in which the leaflets of what otherwise would be a pinnate leaf, are themselves pinnately divided
Extending downwards beyond the point of insertion e.g. when the base of a leaf or a fungal gill is prolonged downwards along the stem in a raised line or narrow wing.
Forking into two equal branches. This may result from an equal division of the growing tip, or may be sympodial, in which the growing tip is aborted and replaced. Typically refers to mode of branch growth, as in Aloe dichotoma, but also to other organs, such as the thorns of various species of Carissa (which morphologically are branches) and thalli or hyphae of various algae and fungi.
Of plant, when male and female reproductive structures develop on different individuals; of inflorescence, male and female flowers in separate inflorescence's; compare Monoecious
Disciform
Having a flowering head that contains both filiform and disk flowers, referring to members of the Asteraceae.
Resembling a disc or plate, having both thickness and parallel faces and with a rounded margin. Also used to describe the flower head of Compositae where there are no ray florets, but only disc florets.
Occurring in widely separated geographic areas, distinctly separate; applies to a discontinuous range in which one or more populations are separated from other potentially interbreeding populations far enough as to preclude gene flow between them.
A plate or ring of structures derived from the receptacle, and occurring between whorls of floral parts: in daisies, the central part of capitulum, hence disk flowers or florets.
Shaped like a flattened circle, symmetrical about both the long and the short axis; about twice as long as broad, tapering equally both to the tip and the base; oval.
William Hemsley Emory, (1811-1887), was born in Maryland of prominent parents and was an Army officer. Boundary surveys were a big part of his life as he was the Director of the Mexican Boundary Survey. Mr. Emory also conducted surveys along the Texas-Mexican border in 1844 and became part of the Northeastern boundary survey between the United States and Canada. Between 1848 and 1853 he conducted a boundary survey along the United States-Mexican border, and surveyed the Gadsden Purchase from 1854 to 1857.
Encelia is a genus of the plant family Asteraceae. It consists mostly of shrubs of arid environments in southwestern North America and western South America.
George Engelmann, (1809-1884), a German-born St. Louis physician and botanist, and prolific author on cacti, North American conifers and oaks. He was educated at the gymnasium in Frankfurt and then at the University of Heidelberg, the University of Berlin and the University of Wurzburg where he received his M.D. degree.
Local extinction, or extirpation, is the condition of a species (or other taxon) that ceases to exist in the chosen geographic area of study, though it still exists elsewhere. Local extinctions are contrasted with global extinctions.
(adjective fasciculate) In botany a cluster or bundle of leaves or flowers growing crowed together, e.g. a tuft of leaves all arising from the same node such as pine needles.
Literally a small flower, but usually refers to the individual true flowers clustered within an inflorescence, particularly in inflorescences of the daisy and grass families.
Vascular plant without significant woody tissue above or at the ground. Forbs and herbs may be annual, biennial, or perennial but always lack significant thickening by secondary woody growth and have perennating buds borne at or below the ground surface.
John Charles Fremont (1813-1890), known as the Pathfinder, Army officer and presidential candidate who collected plants on four hazardous journeys exploring the western United States. Best known for cartography and exploring, he was intensely interested in all natural sciences.
Glaucous (Botanical adjective), leaves or other herbage that is pale bluish-grey, bluish-green or whitish which describes the pale grey or bluish-green appearance of the surfaces of some plants and that is often easily rubbed off. Often applied to plants with a woolly or arachnoid surface, but properly referring to powdery or waxy surfaces, meaning those with a waxy bloom.
James Duncan Graham, (1799-1865), a West Point Graduate and U.S. Army Officer. Mr. Graham is the namesake of Mount Graham, in Graham County, Arizona, and Graham County, Arizona was named after Mount Graham. Mr. Graham is also one of the founders of the United States army's topographical section and well known for his map making skills.
Asa Gray, (1810-1888), one of the most eminent American botanists and professor at Harvard, who played an important part in the identification of many Sierra wildflowers, and whose guides in Yosemite were John Muir and Galen Clark.
Re; herbivorous animal, generally, a reference to herbivores that feed on low growing plants such as grass and other low growing vegetation - compare with Browse
The Great Basin Desert is defined by its animals and plants, yet the exact boundaries are unclear. It is a temperate desert with hot, dry summers and snowy winters. The desert spans a large part of the state of Nevada, and extends into western Utah, eastern California, and Idaho. The desert is one of the four biologically defined deserts in North America, in addition to the Mojave, Sonoran, and Chihuahuan Deserts.
Josiah Gregg, (1806-1850) was an American merchant, explorer and naturalist. He was also wrote about the American Southwest and Northern Mexico regions. Mr. Gregg collected many previously undescribed plants on his merchant trips and during the Mexican–American War after which he went to California.
A seed-bearing plant with unenclosed ovules borne on the surface of a sporophyll; includes, among others, conifers, Ginkgo, Gnetum and cycads. From gymno = naked, exposed; compare angio = covered, enclosed.
Leaf description, narrow and pointed but abruptly enlarged at the base into two acute diverging lobes; may refer only to the base of a leaf with such lobes; compare Sagittate.
The single specimen designated as the type of a species by the original author at the time the species name and description was published. Also see Lectotype
Honeybees are not native to North America and compete with Native Bees. Honeybees were introduced to North America by early settlers and compete with Native Bees. Honeybees are most important to non-native agricultural crops - see Native bees.
A tube or cup-like structure in a flower that includes the bases of sepals, petals, and stamens, and may or may not be connected (adnate) to the ovary.
Native to the area; its presence in that region is the result of only natural processes with no human intervention; not introduced and not necessarily confined to the region discussed (hardly distinct from ‘native’ but usually applied to a smaller area). The term is equivalent to "native" in less scientific usage. For example, the Joshua Tree (Yucca brevifolia) is native to parts of the southwest but indigenous to Joshua National Park, California. Compare; Endemic; Native.
Invasive species; U.S.D.A., Executive Order 13112; an invasive species is defined as a species that is: 1) non-native (or alien) to the ecosystem under consideration and 2) whose introduction causes or is likely to cause economic or environmental harm or harm to human health.
A structure surrounding or supporting, usually a head of flowers. In Asteraceae, it is the group of phyllaries (bracts) surrounding the inflorescence before opening, then supporting the cup-like receptacle on which the head of flowers sits. In Euphorbiaceae it is the cuplike structure that holds the nectar glands, nectar, and head of flowers, and sits above the bract-like cyathophyll structure.
Thomas Henry Kearney, (1874–1956), America Botanist and agronomist known for his work on cotton and date palm breeding, plant taxonomy and the flora of Arizona.
Keystone species (A species with a disproportionately large effect on its natural environment relative to its abundance. A keystone species is a plant or animal that plays a unique and crucial role in the way an ecosystem functions.
Of lobes; with ends irregularly divided into deeply divided, narrow, pointed segments; Of margins; deeply divided into pointed segments in an irregular manner.
A specimen chosen by a later researcher to serve as if it were the holotype (specimen designated in the original description). It is chosen from among the specimens available to the original publishing author (the isotypes, syntypes and/or paratypes) of a scientific name when the holotype was either lost or destroyed, or when no holotype was designated. Also see Holotype.
1. a fruit characteristic of the family Fabaceae, formed from one carpel and either dehiscent along both sides, or indehiscent.
2. a crop species in the family Fabaceae.
3. a plant belonging to the Fabaceae family).
American botanist John Gill Lemmon (1832-1908), who with his wife Sara Allen Plummer Lemmon (1836-1923), plant collector in the American West including western Arizona and in the Sierra Nevada foothills of California. John and his wife Sara, established the Lemmon Herbarium, now part of UC Berkeley’s University and Jepson Herbaria. John served as state botanist for the California State Board of Forestry, ending his career by working to preserve the state's diverse forests.
Typically lens-shaped (lenticular) porous tissue in bark with large intercellular spaces that allows direct exchange of gases between the internal issues and atmosphere through the bark.
A ligulate flower is a 5-lobed, strap-shaped, individual flower in the heads of other members. A ligule is the strap-shaped tongue of the corolla of either a ray flower or of a ligulate flower.
1. Small membranous appendage on the top of the sheath of grass leaves.
2. A minute adaxial appendage near the base of a leaf, e.g. in Selaginella.
3. Extended, strap-like corolla of some daisy florets. See Ligulate.
A sedimentary rock (CaCO3), composed mostly of skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral, forams and molluscs. Its major materials are the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate (CaCO3). see Calcareous Calcareous and Caliche Caliche.
Lindley, John, (1799-1865), the son of a nurseryman, assisted in his father's garden as a boy while collecting wildflowers in nearby areas. John Lindley has a remarkable life and he was one of the most industrious British botanists, author, gardener, orchidologist, and the first professor of botany at London University.
Very narrow in relation to its length, with the sides mostly parallel.
Linneaus, Carl
Carl Linnaeus, (1707-1778), a Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician known as the “father of modern taxonomy” which is the modern system of classifying all organisms. Dr. Linnaeus has inspired and influenced many generations of biologists.
Loam or "loamy soils" is the only soil that is not predominantly sand, silt, or clay; they generally contain more nutrients, moisture, and humus than sandy soils; they have better drainage and infiltration of water and air than silt and clay-rich soils, and are easier to till than clay soils. The different types of loam soils each have slightly different characteristics, with some draining liquids more efficiently than others. Loam soil is suitable for growing most plant varieties.
Loment or lomentum, a pod-like indehiscentlegumefruit that develops constrictions between the segments and at maturity breaks into one-seeded segments.
Harold Frederick Loomis (1896-1976) was born in Farmington, New York and was a botanist and horticulturist by profession. He was also an authority on the millipedes of the West Indies and Central America. Mr. Loomis joined the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 1914 and studied diseases of crop plants.
The Madrean pine–oak woodlands are an ecoregion of the Tropical and subtropical coniferous forests biome, located in North America. They are subtropical woodlands found in the mountains of Mexico and the southwestern United States.
Marcescent refers to the retention of dead and dry elements that normally are shed on a living plant. A marcescent plant is therefore a plant that keeps some organs, most often leaves or flowers, after they die.
One segment of a fruit (a schizocarp) that splits at maturity into units derived from the individual carpels, or a carpel, usually 1-seeded, released by the break-up at maturity of a fruit formed from 2 or more joined carpels. (see Schizocarp).
A mesa is an isolated, flat-topped elevation, ridge or hill, which is bounded from all sides by steep escarpments and stands distinctly above a surrounding plain.
The Southwest monsoon is a pattern of pronounced increase in thunderstorms and rainfall over large areas of the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico, typically occurring between July and mid-September.
North American Natives Bees occur naturally and evolved with and are important to native flowering plants. In North America, Native Bees are found wherever flowers bloom. Honeybees are not native to North America and compete with Native bees - see Honeybees.
Leaves or flowers borne at the same level but on opposite sides of the axis; or (as verb) when something occurs on the same radius as something else, for example anthers opposite sepals; compare Alternate.
1. leaf with veins radiating out from a central point (usually at the top of a petiole), resembling spread out fingers pointing away from the palm.
2. A compound palmate leaf has leaflets that radiate from a central point (usually at the top of a petiole).
(adjective paniculate) a compound raceme; an indeterminate inflorescence in which the flowers are borne on branches of the main axis or on further branches of these.
In biogeography, a pantropical ("across the tropics") distribution is one which covers tropical regions of all continents. The genera Acacia is one example.
(plural papillae, adjective papillose, papillate) a small, elongated protuberance on the surface of an organ, usually an extension of one epidermal cell.
pl. pappi In daisy florets, a tuft or ring of feather-like hairs, scales or bristles, borne above the ovary and outside the corolla and attached to the seeds, (representing the missing sepals/calyx); a tuft of hairs on a fruit; pappi aid in dispersal by wind. the puff-ball on a dandelion are the pappi.
Charles C. Parry, (1823-1890), an English-born American botanist and botanical collector with the Pacific Railway Survey who visited the Southwestern mountains and deserts many times and is remembered in the names of more than a score of southwestern native plants. Dr. Parry studied botany under John Torrey, Asa Gray and George Engelmann.
A pedicel is a stem that attaches single flowers to the inflorescence. It is the branches or stalks that hold each flower in an inflorescence that contains more than one flower. The stem or branch from the main stem of the inflorescence that holds a group of pedicels is called a peduncle.
Parts of the flower; collective term for the petals (corolla) and sepals (calyx), particularly when both are very similar in appearance; compare Tepal.
Remaining attached to the plant beyond the usual time of falling, for instance sepals not falling after flowering, flower parts remaining through maturity of fruit; compare Deciduous, Caducous.
In a flower, one of the segments or divisions of the inner whorl of non-fertile parts surrounding the fertile organs, usually soft and conspicuously coloured; compare; Sepal.
A compound leaf with leaflets arranged on each side of a common petiole or axis; also applied to how the lateral veins are arranged in relation to the main vein. See pinnately.
Having lobes with incisions that extend less than half-way toward the midrib. (Wiki usage notes, deeper incisions are pinnatipartite. Incisions reaching nearly to the midrib are pinnatisect.)
1. a legume, the fruit of a leguminous plant, a dry fruit of a single carpel, splitting along two sutures.
2. siliqua and silicula, the fruit of Brassicaceae, a dry fruit composed of two carpels separated by a partition.
Powdery mass shed from anthers of flowering plants, (angiosperms), microsporangia, seed-bearing plants, (gymnosperms); the microspores of seed plants; pollen-grains.
(adjective: prickly) hard, pointed outgrowth from the surface of a plant (involving several layers of cells but not containing a vein); sharp outgrowth from the bark, detachable without tearing wood; cf. thorn.
A particular form of inflorescence occurring in the Asteraceae and Euphorbiaceae, in which multiple flowers are grouped together to form a flower-like structure, commonly called a head or capitulum.
(plural rachises; rachides) the axis of an inflorescence or a pinnate leaf; for example ferns; secondary rachis is the axis of a pinna in a bipinnate leaf distal to and including the lowermost pedicel attachment.
A 19th-century person of wide-ranging knowledge and learning making notable contributions to botany and zoology. By 1818, he had collected and named more than 250 new species of plants and animals. Rafinesque published 6,700 binomial names of plants, many of which have priority over more familiar names. Some of the animals named by Rafinesque include the Mule Deer, Odocoileus hemionus, the Black-tailed Prairie Dog, Cynomys ludovicianus and the White-footed Mouse, Peromyscus leucopus. Rafinesque was thought to be eccentric and an erratic genius by many of his peers, he was an outcast in the American scientific community. Constantine Samuel Rafinesque-Schmaltz, (1783–1840)
The axis of a flower, in other words, floral axis; torus; for example in Asteraceae, the floral base or common receptacle is the expanded summit of the peduncle on which the flowers are inserted.
(adj. Creeping rootstock; creeping stems;) A plant whose above ground stem originates from a rhizome. The stems grows horizontally under or along the ground and often sends out roots and shoots. New plants develop from the shoots.
A rosette is a circular arrangement of leaves, with all the leaves at a similar height. Though rosettes usually sit near the soil, their structure is an example of a modified stem.
Dr. Joseph Trimble Rothrock, (1839-1922), McVeytown, PA. Dr. Rothrock was a forester, professor of botany at the University of Pennsylvania. He earned a B.S. degree in botany at Harvard in 1862 where he fell under the sway of the famed Asa Gray. He served as botanist and surgeon on the Wheeler Survey of 1873-1875, a geographical and geological exploration and survey to various wild regions west of the Great Plains (100th meridian) under Lt. George M. Wheeler.
Olaus Olai Rudbeck (1660-1740), Rudbeck the Younger was a physician, a keen ornithologist, and a professor of anatomy as well as botany at Uppsala University, a position he took over from his father, Rudbeck the Elder and was the author of De fundamentali plantarum notitia. He was the botany professor of Carl Linnaeus. He specialized in anatomy, botany, zoology, and pharmacology. Later in his life he turned his attention to the study of languages.
A plant that colonises or occupies disturbed waste ground. Ruderal species typically dominate the disturbed area for a few years, gradually losing the competition to other native species. The word ruderal comes from the Latin rudus, meaning rubble.
Leaf description, shaped like the head of an arrow; narrow and pointed but gradually enlarged at base into two straight lobes directed downwards; may refer only to the base of a leaf with such lobe; compare Hastate.
1. a reduced or rudimentary leaf, for example around a dormant bud.
2. a flattened epidermal outgrowth, such as those commonly found on the leaves and rhizomes of ferns.
Of plant parts or surfaces that may be stiff or scaly, dry membranous appearance, shriveled, they are often not green in color but yellowish, whitish or brownish.
Arthur Carl Victor Schott, (1814-1875), was German-American naturalist, artist, topographical engineer, cartographer, botanist and geologist. In 1851, Schott worked as a member of William H. Emory's team in mapping the border separating Texas and the adjacent Mexican territory (Mexican Boundary Survey). Schott contributed more field data to the border maps than any other member of the team, and became one of the first surveyors of the Rio Grande.
(Botany - of a cymose inflorescence) Resembling a scorpion's tail, as in a scorpioid cyme; of a cymose inflorescence, when it branches alternately on one side and then the other; compare Helicoid; Circinate.
In a flower, one of the segments or divisions of the outer whorl of non-fertile parts surrounding the fertile organs, usually green; compare petal; compare Petal.
Perennial, multi-stemmed woody plant that is usually less than 4 to 5 meters (13 to 16 feet) in height. Shrubs typically have several stems arising from or near the ground, but may be taller than 5 meters or single-stemmed under certain environmental conditions. Applies to vascular plants only.
A fruit (seed capsule) of 2 fused carpels with the length less than three times the width. When the length is greater than three times the width of the dried fruit it is referred to as a silique; compare Silique.
A fruit (seed capsule) of 2 fused carpels with the length being more than three times the width. When the length is less than three times the width of the dried fruit it is referred to as a silicle; compare Silicle.
Undivided, for instance a leaf not divided into leaflets (note, however, that a simple leaf may be entire, toothed or lobed) or an unbranched hair or inflorescence.
(adjective spinose) a stiff, sharp structure, formed by the modification of a plant organ that contains vascular tissue; e.g. a lateral branch or a stipule; includes thorns.
Low-growing shrub usually under 0.5 m (1.5 feet) tall, never exceeding 1 meter (3 feet) tall at maturity. Applies to vascular plants only. A dwarf-shrub in the FGDC classification.
Rock fragments of any size or shape derived from and lying at the base of a cliff or very steep rock slope. The cumulated mass of such loose broken rock formed chiefly by falling, rolling, or sliding.
Part of a flower or perianth segment, either sepal or petal; usually used when the parts of the perianth are difficult to distinguish, e.g. the petals (caylx) and sepals (corolla) share the same color, or the petals are absent and the sepals are colorful.
George G. Thurber, (1821-1890), was called the most accomplished horticulturist in America and botanist and quartermaster of the United States and Mexican Boundary Survey, 1850-1854. He was also an American pharmacist, self-taught botanist and avid plant collector.
John Torrey, (1796-1873), a professor of chemistry and one of the giants of North American botany who described hundreds of plants brought or sent back by such explorers as John C. Frement, William Emory, Charles Wilkes, Joseph Nicollet, Howard Stansbury and Charles Pickering.
Perennial, woody plant with a single stem (trunk), normally greater than 4 to 5 meters (13 to 16 feet) in height; under certain environmental conditions, some tree species may develop a multi-stemmed or short growth form (less than 4 meters or 13 feet in height). Applies to vascular plants only.
Trichomes
In non-filamentous plants, any hair-like outgrowth from epidermis, e.g. a hair or bristle; sometimes restricted to unbranched epidermal outgrowths.
Cut off squarely; with an abruptly transverse end.
Tubercle
A small wart-like outgrowth.
Tunicate
Having successive, close-fitting concentric coats, as in an onion bulb.
Turbinate
Shaped like a spinning top or beetroot.
Twining
To wind or coil about nearby supporting structure for climbing, to twist together, as stems, a winding course of growth.
Type
The type of a genus name is a specimen which is also the type of a species name. The species name that has that type can also be referred to as the type of the genus name.
(adjective umbellate) A racemose inflorescence in which all the individual flower stalks arise in a cluster at the top of the peduncle and are of about equal length; in a simple umbel, each stalk is unbranched and bears only one flower; a cymose umbel is an apparent umbel but its flowers open centrifugally.
A small bladder; a membranous bladder-like sac enclosing an ovary or fruit; in sedges a fruit in which the pericarp is larger than, and loosely encloses, the seed.
Verbena is a genus in the family Verbenaceae. It contains about 250 species of annual and perennial herbaceous or semi-woody flowering plants. The majority of the species are native to the Americas and Asia.
Carl Ludwig Willdenow, (1775-1812) was a German botanist, pharmacist, and plant taxonomist. Mr. Willdenow is a founder of phytogeography which is the study of the geographic distribution of plants.
One of the two lateral petals of a flower of subfamily Faboideae of family Fabaceae, located between the adaxial standard (banner) petal and the two abaxial keel petals.
Frederick Adolf Wislizenus, (1810-1889), Army surgeon, explorer, botanist and plant collector of German birth who travelled extensively in the southwestern United States.
Charles Wright, (1811-1885), an American botanical collector that collected plants and sending specimens to Professor Asa Gray at Harvard, eventually becoming one of his most trusted collectors. In 1851, with Gray’s help, Mr. Wright became part of the Mexican Boundary Survey, and helped collect many of the 2,600 species that were sent back to Professor John Torrey for description and identification. His name was honored by George Engelman who gave it to a cactus, Opuntia wrightii.
Xeromorph (A plant with structural features (e.g. hard or succulent leaves) or functional adaptations that prevent water loss by evaporation; usually associated with arid habitats, but not necessarily drought-tolerant; Also see Xerophyte.
A plant generally living in a dry habitat, typically showing xeromorphic or succulent adaptation; a plant able to tolerate long periods of drought; compare Halophyte.
Bilaterally symmetrical; symmetrical about one vertical plane only; applies to flowers in which the perianth segments within each whorl vary in size and shape; compare Actinomorphic, Irregular.
