Botanical Survey of India | Flora of India

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OLACACEAE
B.P. Uniyal



Shrubs or trees, erect, scandent or climbing, unarmed or occasionally armed. Leaves alternate, simple, entire, exstipulate. Flowers bisexual, rarely unisexual (the plants then dioecious), bracteate, in axillary racemes, panicles, spikes, cymes, fascicles or solitary in the axils. Sepals 3-6, forming a cupuJar calyx, 3-6 toothed or lobed, rarely absent. Petals 3-6, free or connate at base, occasionally tubular. Disc intrastaminal or extrastaminal, annular or consisting of glands, alternating with the petals. Stamens as many as or 2-5 times the number of petals, some of them staminodial. Staminodial filaments distinct or adnate to the sepals or petals or connate into a sheath around the style; anthers tetrasporangiate, opening by longitudinal slits or seldom by terminal valves. Carpels (2-) 3 (-5), united to form a superior or inferior ovary; ovary 2-5-loculed at the base, 1-loculed above; style 1; stigma 2-5 -lobed; ovule solitary in each locule. Fruit drupaceous or a nut, 1-seeded, often included in an accrescent calyx.

Pantropical; 25 genera and 250 species, 6 genera and 16 species in India.

SLEUMER, H.( 1935). Olacaceae. In : Eng. & Prantl, Pflanzenfam. ed. 2. 16b: 5-32. SLEUMER, H.( 1980). A taxonomic account of Olacaceae of Asia, Malesia and the adjacent areas. Blumea 26: 145-168. SLEUMER, H. (1984) Olacaceae. Fl. Males. Ser. 1, 10: 1-29.



KEY TO THE GENERA


1a. Climbing tendrillar shrubs; leaves palmatinerved at base; base subpeltate 2. Erythropalum
b. Plants non tendrillar; leaves penninerved; base not suppeltate 2
2a. Staminodes present 3. Olax
b. Staminodes absent 3
3a. Stamens 8 or 10; half episepalous. half epipetalous; plants often armed 6. Ximenia
b. Stamens all epipetalous; plants not armed 4
4a. Petals entirely free; calyx accrescent, almost covering the fruit 5. Strombosia
b. Petals connate at least at base; calyx not accrescent 5
5a. Calyx cupular; petals thick, fleshy; anthers penicillate distally 1. Anacolosa
b. Calyx indistinct; petals thin; anthers not penicillate 4. Schoepfia


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