Deciduous trees or shrubs with usually terete branches lacking terminal buds; winter buds each protected by a single outer scale, buds sometimes glutinous; branches ± flexible
Leaves
alternate, petiolate or sessile, oblong, lanceolate or linear, entire or serrulate; stipules various
Inflorescences
small, dense, usually erect, firm catkins, appearing before or with the leaves
Flowers
unisexual, entomophilous; borne in axil of an entire bract, with 1 or 2 small nectariferous glands at base
Male flowers
with 2 stamens or, in a few species, 3-many; filaments slender, free or sometimes connate, exceeding the scale
Female flowers
of a single ovary, composed of 2 carpels, sessile or stipitate; ovules often 4-8, arranged on 2 placentas; style often short, with 2 short, retuse or bifid stigmas
Capsule
many-seeded, dehiscing by 2 recurving valves
Seeds
many, long, enveloped in silky wool
x = 19 (aneuploids, polyploidy, B-chromosomes)
Nomenclature:
Salix
L.
Linnaeus: 1015 (1753)
Linnaeus: 456 (1754)
Adanson: 376 (1763)
Jussieu: 408 (1789)
Willdenow: 655 (1806)
Thunberg: 30 (1823)
Andersson: 1 (1867)
Andersson: 190 (1868)
Bentham: 411 (1880)
Pax: 36 (1888)
Burtt Davy: 62 (1922)
Skan: 575 (1925)
Burtt Davy: 431 (1932)
Adamson: 310 (1950)
Friedrich-Holzhammer: 1 (1967)
Immelman: 171 (1987)
Wilmot-Dear: 120 (1991)
Distribution & Notes:
Global
: ± 400, mostly in temperate parts of the northern hemisphere
Southern Africa
: 1 indigenous species with 5 subspecies, widespread along rivers; 4 exotic species have become naturalised of which one: *
Salix babylonica
L., the Weeping Willow, occurs widely along rivers and streams
References:
ADAMSON, R.S. 1950.
Salicaceae
Lindl. In R.S. Adamson & T.M. Salter,
Flora of the Cape Peninsula
. Juta, Cape Town
ADANSON, M. 1763. Famille des Châtaigniers.
Castaneae
.
Familles des plantes
2. Vincent, Paris
ANDERSSON, N.J. 1867. Monographia Salicum hucusque cognitarum.
Kungliga Svenska vetenskapsakademiens handlingar
6,1
ANDERSSON, N.J. 1868.
Salicineae
.
Salix
. In A. de Candolle,
Prodromus
16,2. Masson & Sons, Paris
BENTHAM, G. 1880.
Salicineae
. In G. Bentham & J.D. Hooker,
Genera plantarum
3. Lovell Reeve & Co., London
BURTT DAVY, J. 1922. The distribution and origin of
Salix
in South Africa.
Journal of Ecology
10
BURTT DAVY, J. 1932.
Salicaceae
.
A manual of the flowering plants and ferns of the Transvaal with Swaziland
1. Longmans, Green & Co., London
FRIEDRICH-HOLZHAMMER, M. 1967.
Salicaceae
.
Prodromus einer Flora von Südwestafrika
14
IMMELMAN, K.L. 1987. Synopsis of the genus
Salix
(
Salicaceae
) in southern Africa.
Bothalia
17
JUSSIEU, A.L. DE. 1789.
Amentaceae
, les Amentacées.
Genera plantarum secundum ordines naturales disposita
2. Barrois & Herissant, Paris
LINNAEUS, C. 1753.
Species plantarum
, edn 1. Laurentius Salvius, Stockholm
LINNAEUS, C. 1754.
Genera plantarum
, edn 5. Laurentius Salvius, Stockholm
PAX, F. 1888.
Salicaceae
.
Die natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien
3,1
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