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BOTANICAL GLOSSARY

Glossary of commonly used botanical terms and their definitions. Use the search bar below to look up a botanical term.

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15 Random Botanical Terms

Sessile - Lacking a stalk of any kind: a flower without a pedicel or a leaf without a petiole.

Involucre - A whorl of distinct or united leaves or bracts beneath a flower or cluster of flowers commonly found especially on species in Asteraceae but also in Apiaceae, Dipsacaceae and Polygonaceae. Also a bract or bract pair subtending the inflorescence of some members of Betulaceae, especially Carpinus and Corylus.

Bract - A reduced or modified leaf occurring at the base of a flower or group of flowers. Bracts are sometimes arranged in rows, like shingles on a roof, usually closely cupping the blossoms of Asteraceae (Sunflower Family); cf. Phyllary. Sometimes brightly colored or petallike, as in Castilleja spp. (paintbrush), or threadlike, as in Daucus carota (Queen Anne's Lace). ...

Thorn - A sharp-pointed structure formed by a modified branch.

Clasping - Leaf partially encircles the stem.

Aril - An outer covering or appendage of some seeds.

Special Value to Bumble Bees - Recognized by pollination ecologists as attracting large numbers of bumble bees.

Bilateral symmetry - Usually referencing flower structure, descripes a plant part or parts that may be divided along a single plane forming two mirror-image halves; zygomorphic, irregular flower.

Incomplete flower - A flower lacking one or more of the following: stamens, pistils, petals, sepals.

Biennial - A plant that takes two years to complete the flowering cycle. Typically it grows vegetatively the first year and flowers and fruits during the second year before dying.

Axillary - Growing from an axil.

Petiolule - The stalk of the leaflet of a compound leaf.

Internode - The part of the stem between leaves or branches.

Vine - Plants that climb by twining, tendrils, or clinging.

Tendril - A slender coiling or twining structure modified from a leaf, branch, or other organ.