Dear members, Here are some basic texts about the family Salicaceae.
*Salicaceae * The family Salicaceae commonly known as the willow family was first described by Mirbel (1815) as Salicineae. The members of this family are characterized as: dioecious, tall trees, shrubs, or prostrate, low creeping carpet-like shrublets; leaves alternate, rarely subopposite, and simple; inflorescence erect or pendulous catkins; flowers unisexual, incomplete; stamens 2-many; filaments free or united; carpels 2 or 4, syncarpous; ovary superior, unilocular with parietal or basal placentation; fruit a 2-4-valved capsule; seeds minute, comose. In the Cronquist system of classification the Salicaceae were treated in their own order Salicales, and contained only three genera (*Salix <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willow>*, *Populus <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poplar>* and *Chosenia <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chosenia>*), but APG includes it in Malpighiales <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malpighiales>. Many genera from the family Flacourtiaceae including the type genus<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Type_genus> *Flacourtia <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flacourtia>*, have now been transferred to the Salicaceae <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salicaceae> in the APG II system <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/APG_II_system> of classification which is based on molecular phylogeny<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molecular_phylogeny>( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salicaceae & http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flacourtiaceae ). In India two genera *Populus* L. and *Salix* L. are reported under Salicaceae sensu stricto. A key to the genera is presented below: 1a. Vegetative buds with many outer scales; terminal buds frequently present; catkins mostly pendulous; floral bracts dentate or lobed; flower with disc but without any glands ................................. ................................. 1. *Populus* 1b.Vegetative buds with one outer scale; terminal bud absent; catkins generally erect; occasionally spreading or pendulous; floral bracts generally entire; flowers without any disc, but with glands................................... 2. *Salix* I'll post some more text in coming days. Thanks, Sukla ------------------------------------------------ Sukla Chanda, PhD Science & Education, The Field Museum, Chicago IL. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "efloraofindia" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to indiantreepix+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to indiantreepix@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/indiantreepix. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
