Trees or shrubs, usually with milky latex; monoecious or dioecious
Leaves
alternate, shortly petiolate, entire or remotely crenate, with 2 glands at junction of petiole; stipules small, caducous
Inflorescence
axillary, sessile, spicate, with many male flowers above and a solitary or few basal, female flowers
Petals
0
Disc
0
Male flowers
small, sessile; calyx (2-)5-lobed, free, imbricate; stamens 3; filaments free or united into a slender tube, exserted; pistillode 0
Female flowers
small, shortly pedunculate; calyx 3-5-lobed, ± free; ovary (2)3-locular, with 1 ovule in each locule, glabrous; styles (2)3, connate into a column, with lanceolate, entire lobes
Fruit
a (2)3-coccous capsule, valves not separating immediately; exocarp smooth, not separating from endocarp; endocarp thinly crustaceous; columella persistent
Seeds
globose or ovoid; caruncle minute, separating from seed and remaining adnate to columella; testa crustaceous; albumen fleshy; cotyledons broad, flat
Nomenclature:
Spirostachys
Sond.
Sonder: 106 (1850)
Prain: 512 (1920)
Radcliffe-Smith: 385 (1987)
Webster: 121 (1994)
Radcliffe-Smith: 313 (1996)
Distribution & Notes:
Global
: Species 2; subtropical East Africa
Southern Africa
: Namibia, Northern Province and KwaZulu-Natal
References:
PRAIN, D. 1920.
Euphorbiaceae
[in part].
Flora capensis
5, 2
RADCLIFFE-SMITH, A. 1987.
Euphorbiaceae
.
Flora of tropical East Africa
.
Euphorbiaceae
Part 1
RADCLIFFE-SMITH, A. 1996.
Euphorbiaceae
.
Flora zambesiaca
9, 4
SONDER, O.W. 1850. Beiträge zur Flora von Südafrika.
Linnaea
23
WEBSTER, G.L. 1994. Synopsis of the genera and suprageneric taxa of
Euphorbiaceae
.
Annals of the Missouri Botanical Garden
81
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