Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.
Albert Einstein
Anther: The pollen-bearing part of the stamen.
Apical fringe: The top portion of the corona which is usually dissected into a fringe.
Bicarpellate: Composed of two carpels. A carpel is one of the units that compose a pistil or ovary.
Bract: A modified leaf, usually smaller than true leaves and associated with the flowers. They may be colorful and showy as in poinsettias and bougainvilleas.
Calyx: The outer whorl of floral envelopes, composed of separate or united sepals.
Campanulate: Bell-shaped.
Caudex: The swollen stem base of certain plants.
Coma: A tuft of soft hairs on a seed.
Corolla: The inner circle or whorl of floral envelopes. A corolla is the colored, showy part of the flower consisting of fused petals and corona. When the parts of the floral envelope are separate they are called petals.
Corona: Literally, a crown. A circular petal-like appendage in the center of the corolla.
Cultivar: A horticultural variety that originated under cultivation and is of suffi- cient importance to require a name. Cultivar names follow the genus and species and are indicated by the use of single quotation marks.
Cuneate: Basically wedge-shaped or narrowly triangular, with the narrow end at the point of attachment.
Cyme: A type of inflorescence characterized by being determinate and broad, in which the central flowers usually are the first to open.
Dodder: A parasitic climber that attaches itself to a host plant. Exserted: Projecting out.
Flocculation: The process of neutralizing electrical charges on colloids. In clay soils the addition of gypsum and compost or other organic matter is generally utilized, allowing the minute particles of clay to adhere to other particles, thereby forming larger aggregates insuring that oxygen and drainage will be present to allow root penetration.
Follicle: A dry, dehiscent fruit with usually more than one seed and opening only along the ventral suture.
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Gall: Gall may appear on any part of a plant and has many causes, including fungi, bacteria, viruses, nematodes and insects. Evidence of gall infestation is usually a tumor or growth in a wide diversity of shapes.
Glabrous: Smooth, without hairs of any kind. Glycosides: Sugar derivatives widely found in plants. Half-hardy: Somewhat resistant to damage from freezing. Inflorescence: A flower cluster having a common axis.
Introrse: Facing towards the center or inward; as an anther that dehisces towards the center of a flower.
Nectaries: The nectar-secreting glands. Petaloid: To resemble a petal, or a part of a plant that resembles a petal.
Petiole: A leaf stalk.
Pistil: The seed-bearing part of a plant consisting of the stigma, style and ovary.
Puberulous: Covered with hairs that are minute, soft and erect.
Rank: A vertical row. When a flower is single, it has one row of petals, or one rank. Two ranks indicate a double flower.
Sagittate: Shaped like an arrowhead. In leaves, with the basal lobes pointing down- ward. Sepal: One of the separate parts of a calyx, usually green.
Sport: A plant or part of a plant exhibiting marked variation from normal; a mutation.
Stamen: The pollen bearing organ which consists of the anther and filament (stalk).
Stigma: The tip of the pistil upon which the pollen falls and germinates.
Style: The usually elongated part of the pistil between the stigma and ovary.
Taxa: Scientific classifications within a system.
Taxonomist: A person specializing in the science of classification of objects, animals or plants.
Leisure, slowness, contemplation: in an age of presumed
efficiency and professionalism, these amateur virtues
are perhaps despired, but they may underlie the greatest
joys of gardening, and of life. It is not enough to grow
the most beautiful things. It is even better to explore
them, to identify with them, and to grow into a rather
new consciousness of them...
Henry Mitchell,
The Essential Earthman
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