e-Key v3 - Psilotrichum
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Interactive keys to the identification of seed plants of southern Africa using keys based on plant morphology.

Amaranthaceae - Amaranthoideae - Amarantheae - Aervinae - Psilotrichum Blume

Description :

  • Perennial herbs or subshrubs, prostrate to erect or scandent, trichotomously branched
  • Leaves opposite or partly alternate, ovate or elliptic-lanceolate, entire
  • Inflorescences axillary and terminal, sessile to long-pedunculate, bracteate heads or spikes or broad, lax, panicles; bracts persistent, finally spreading or deflexed
  • Flowers bisexual, solitary in axils of bracts; bracteoles 2, falling with fruit
  • Tepals 5, free, inner 2 with broader hyaline margin than outer 2, with central intermediate, sometimes gibbous at base, usually pubescent on outer surface
  • Stamens 5, shortly monadelphous at base, without or rarely with small alternating pseudostaminodes; anthers 2-thecous
  • Ovary subglobose or oblong in outline; ovule solitary, suspended from a long, basal funicle; style slender but rather short; stigma bifid or capitate
  • Capsule thin-walled, indehiscent, enclosed in hardened base of perianth
  • Seed smooth, lenticular, brownish

Nomenclature:

  • Psilotrichum Blume
    • Blume: 544 (1825)
    • Hooker: 32 (1880)
    • Schinz: 110 (1893)
    • Baker & Clarke: 57 (1909)
    • Cooke & Wright: 424 (1910)
    • Schinz: 60 (1934)
    • Verdcourt: 489 (1964)
    • Townsend: 90 (1985)
    • Townsend: 101 (1988)
    • Townsend: 87 (1993)
  • Psilostachys Hochst.
    • Hochstetter: 6, t. 4 (1844)

Distribution & Notes:

  • Global : Species ± 18, mostly in tropical Africa, also in tropical Asia
  • Southern Africa : Species 1: Psilotrichum scleranthum Thwaites (= P. africanum Oliv.), Northern Province and KwaZulu-Natal

References:

  • BAKER, J.G. & CLARKE, C.B. 1909. Amarantaceae . Flora of tropical Africa 6,1
  • BLUME, C.L. 1825. Amarantaceae . Bijdragen tot de flora van Nederlandsch lndië 2. Lands Drukkerij, Batavia
  • COOKE, T. & WRIGHT, C.H. 1910. Amarantaceae . Flora capensis 5,1
  • HOCHSTETTER, C.F. 1844. Über einige neue Pflanzen aus Abyssinien. Flora 27
  • HOOKER, J.D. 1880. Amarantaceae . In G. Bentham & J.D. Hooker, Genera plantarum 3,1. Lovell Reeve & Co., London
  • SCHINZ, H. 1893. Amarantaceae . Die natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien III,1a
  • SCHINZ, H. 1934. Amaranthaceae . Die natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien , edn 2, 16c
  • TOWNSEND, C.C. 1985. Flora of tropical East Africa . Amaranthaceae
  • TOWNSEND, C.C. 1988. Amaranthaceae . Flora zambesiaca 9,1
  • TOWNSEND, C.C. 1993. Amaranthaceae . In K. Kubitzki, J.G. Rohwer & V. Bittrich, The families and genera of vascular plants - dicotyledons 2. Springer-Verlag, Berlin
  • VERDCOURT, B. 1964. Notes from the East African Herbarium 15. Amaranthaceae . Kew Bulletin 17

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