Family Pteridophyllaceae
Pteridophyllaceae (Murb.) Sugiura ex Nak.~ Fumariaceae, Papaveraceae sensu lato Habit and leaf form. Stemless herbs (with Blechnum-like leaves); non-laticiferous and without coloured juice. Perennial; with a basal aggregation of leaves (the leaves all radical); rhizomatous. Leaves alternate (surrounded at the base by several large, orbicular, membranous cataphylls); simple, or compound; if considered ‘compound’, very evenly pinnate. Lamina if considered ‘entire’, very deeply dissected; regularly, evenly pinnatifid. Leaves exstipulate. General anatomy. Plants without laticifers. Leaf anatomy. Stomata present; mainly confined to one surface (the abaxial); anomocytic. The mesophyll without sclerenchymatous idioblasts. Stem anatomy. Secondary thickening absent. Reproductive type, pollination. Fertile flowers hermaphrodite. Plants hermaphrodite. Inflorescence, floral, fruit and seed morphology. Flowers aggregated in ‘inflorescences’; in fascicles. Inflorescences scapiflorous (the scape erect, simple or very slightly branched); (scapes) bearing more or less distant, two-flowered fascicles of flowers on slender pedicels. Flowers regular to somewhat irregular (almost regular); cyclic. Free hypanthium absent. Perianth with distinct calyx and corolla; 6; 3 whorled (2+2+2); isomerous. Calyx 2; 1 whorled; polysepalous; neither appendaged nor spurred (and the sepals not lobed); not persistent (caducous); open in bud (not enclosing the flower bud). Corolla 4; 2 whorled (2+2); polypetalous; unequal but not bilabiate, or regular (the petals ‘subequal’); white; deciduous (caducous). Petals entire. Androecium ostensibly 4. Androecial members unbranched; free of the perianth; free of one another; 1 whorled. Androecium exclusively of fertile stamens. Stamens 4; oppositisepalous; alternating with the corolla members (diagonal); very shortly filantherous (without basal nectaries). Anthers oblong; all bilocular; tetrasporangiate (?). Pollen shed as single grains. Pollen grains aperturate; (2–)3(–4) aperturate; colpate. Gynoecium 2 carpelled. Carpels isomerous with the perianth. The pistil 1 celled. Gynoecium syncarpous; synstylovarious; superior. Ovary 1 locular (flattened). Gynoecium stylate. Styles 1; apical. Stigmas 2; commissural. Placentation basal. Ovules in the single cavity 2–4; non-arillate (at least, the seeds neither strophiolate nor carunculate); anatropous, or anatropous to campylotropous; bitegmic; crassinucellate. Outer integument not contributing to the micropyle. Endosperm formation nuclear. Fruit non-fleshy; dehiscent; capsular-indehiscent. Capsules (two) valvular (siliculiform, dehiscence acropetal). Fruit many-seeded. Physiology, biochemistry. Alkaloids present. Geography, cytology. Holarctic. Temperate. Japan. N = 9. Taxonomy. Subclass Dicotyledonae; Crassinucelli. Dahlgren’s Superorder Ranunculiflorae; Papaverales (?). Cronquist’s Subclass Magnoliidae; Papaverales. APG 3 core angiosperms; peripheral eudicot; Superorder Ranunculanae; Order Ranunculales (as a synonym of Papaveraceae). Species 1. Genera 1; only genus, Pteridophyllum. Illustrations. |
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