Flora Zambesiaca

Taxon Detail

FZ volume:2 part:2 (1966) Anacardiaceae by Rosette Fernandes and A. Fernandes

Anacardiaceae Key

Description:

Trees, shrubs at times sarmentose, shrublets or suffrutices, sometimes thorny, producing resins, gums or latex. Leaves alternate, opposite or verticillate, exstipulate, simple, imparipinnate or (1)3-foliolate. Inflorescence of axillary or terminal panicles or spike-like racemes. Flowers dioecious, monoecious or polygamous, small, 3–5-merous, actinomorphic or rarely irregular. Sepals united or sometimes free, imbricate or valvate. Stamens, inserted round the disk or sometimes on the disk, as many as or twice as many as the petals or numerous, usually all fertile in the male flowers. Disk annular, cup-shaped or stipitiform, entire, crenulate or lobed or absent. Ovary, sometimes present and vestigial in the male flowers, (1)3–5(?)-carpous, 1–6-locular, rarely multilocular, loculi 1-ovulate; ovule anatropous; styles free or ± connate. Fruit drupaceous or dry with ± resinous or oleaginous mesocarp and bony or coriaceous endocarp, generally with a 1-plurilocular 1–3-seeded stone. Seeds erect, horizontal or pendulous with membranous or coriaceous testa; endosperm absent or rarely present and very thin.

Notes:

Schinus molle var. areira (L.) DC., the so-called Californian Pepper Tree, S. terebinthifolius Raddi, the Brazilian Pepper, Rhus copallina L., the Black Sumach, and R. succedanea L., the Wax Tree, are grown as ornamentals in avenues and gardens.