e-Key <span id="jodit_selection_marker_1699277527169_8535498154757499" data-jodit_selection_marker="start" style="line-height: 0; display: none;"></span>v3 - Phyto<span id="jodit_selection_marker_1699277527170_9962006229287683" data-jodit_selection_marker="end" style="line-height: 0; display: none;"></span>lacca
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Interactive keys to the identification of seed plants of southern Africa using keys based on plant morphology.

Phytolaccaceae - Phytolaccoideae - Phytolacca L.

Description:

  • Herbs or shrublets, rarely trees, sometimes scandent; plants sometimes dioecious
  • Leaves sometimes ± succulent
  • Inflorescences terminal or axillary racemes, spikes or panicles; pedicels bracteate and bibracteolate
  • Flowers bisexual or unisexual, ± regular
  • Tepals 5, aestivation quincuncial, rarely 4, equal, oblong, spreading or reflexed
  • Stamens 5-30, functional or rudimentary; filaments subulate, free, adnate to base of tepals or emerging from rim of narrow ring; anthers oblong
  • Gynoecium of 5-16 free or slightly connate carpels; ovule solitary and basal; styles equal in number to carpels, free or connate at base
  • Fruit an aggregation of 1-seeded, lobed berries or a syncarpous, lobed berry, rounded or depressed-globose, fleshy, thin-skinned
  • Seed lenticular or reniform, beaked or obtuse at base; testa black and brittle
  • x = 9 (polyploidy)

Nomenclature:

  • Phytolacca L.
    • Linnaeus: 441 (1753)
    • Linnaeus: 200 (1754)
    • Moquin-Tandon: 31 (1849)
    • Sonder: 156 (1860)
    • Hooker: 84 (1880)
    • Heimerl: 10 (1889)
    • Baker & Wright: 96 (1909)
    • Walter: 36 (1909)
    • Heimerl: 155 (1934)
    • Adamson: 363 (1950)
    • Webb: 112 (1964)
    • Nowicke: 303 (1968)
    • Polhill: 1 (1971)
    • Hewson: 1 (1984)
    • Brown & Varadarajan: 49 (1985)
    • Stannard: 164 (1988)
    • Rohwer: 512 (1993)

Distribution & Notes:

  • Global: Species ± 25, frequently hybridising; in tropical or subtropical regions, mainly in America, few in Africa and Asia; often weedy
  • Southern Africa: Species 4, Northern Province, North-West, Gauteng, Mpumalanga, Swaziland, Free State, KwaZulu-Natal, Lesotho, Western and Eastern Cape; *Phytolacca dioica L., an ornamental tree with a huge, soft-wooded trunk, sometimes occurs as an escape

References:

  • ADAMSON, R.S. 1950. Phytolaccaceae Lindl. In R.S. Adamson & T.M. Salter, Flora of the Cape Peninsula. Juta, Cape Town
  • BAKER, J.G. & WRIGHT, C.H. 1909. Phytolaccaceae. Flora of tropical Africa 6,1
  • BROWN, G.K. & VARADARAJAN, G.S. 1985. Studies in CARYOPHYLLALES 1: Re-evaluation of classification of Phytolaccaceae s.l. Systematic Botany 10
  • HEIMERL, A. 1889. Phytolaccaceae. Die natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien 3,1b
  • HEIMERL, A. 1934. Phytolaccaceae. Die natürlichen Pflanzenfamilien, edn 2,16c
  • HEWSON, H.J. 1984. Phytolaccaceae. Flora of Australia 4
  • HOOKER, J.D. 1880. Phytolaccaceae. In G. Bentham & J.D. Hooker, Genera plantarum 3,1. Lovell Reeve & Co., London
  • LINNAEUS, C. 1753. Species plantarum, edn 1. Laurentius Salvius, Stockholm
  • LINNAEUS, C. 1754. Genera plantarum, edn 5. Laurentius Salvius, Stockholm
  • MOQUIN-TANDON, C.H.B.A. 1849. Phytolaccaceae. In A.P. de Candolle, Prodromus 13,2. Treuttel & Würtz, Paris
  • NOWICKE, J.W. 1968. Palynotaxonomic study of the Phytolaccaceae. Annals of the Missouri Botanical Garden 55, 3
  • POLHILL, R.M. 1971. Flora tropical East Africa. Phytolaccaceae
  • ROHWER, J.G. 1993. Phytolaccaceae. In K. Kubitzki, J.G. Rohwer & V. Bittrich, The families and genera of vascular plants - dicotyledons 2. Springer-Verlag, Berlin
  • SONDER, O.W. 1860. Phytolacceae. Flora capensis 1
  • STANNARD, B.L. 1988. Phytolaccaceae. Flora zambesiaca 9,1
  • WALTER, H. 1909. Phytolaccaceae. Das Pflanzenreich 4, 83 (Heft 39)
  • WEBB, D.A. 1964. Phytolaccaceae. Flora europaea 1

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