Turraea L.

Scientific Description

Family Meliaceae.

Family Meliaceae, Subfamily Melioideae, Tribe Turraeeae.

Habit and leaf form. Trees, or shrubs. ‘Normal’ plants. Leaves cauline. To 1.5–5 m high. Mesophytic. Leaves medium-sized; alternate; spiral; petiolate; with ‘normal’ orientation; simple, or compound (rarely (in 1 species)); epulvinate, or pulvinate (rarely (in 1 species)). Leaf blades dorsiventral; entire; flat; ovate, or elliptic; pinnately veined; cross-venulate; obtuse. Mature leaf blades adaxially glabrous, or pubescent (occasionally); abaxially pubescent, or glabrous (occasionally). Leaf blade margins entire, or crenate (or repand); flat. Leaf anatomy. Hairs present. Unicellular hairs present. Complex hairs absent.

Reproductive type, pollination. Fertile flowers hermaphrodite. Unisexual flowers absent. Plants hermaphrodite. Plants not viviparous; homostylous. Floral nectaries present (small), or absent. Nectar secretion from the disk (when present). Entomophilous; via lepidoptera (moths).

Inflorescence and flower features. Flowers solitary, or aggregated in ‘inflorescences’. Inflorescence few-flowered. Flowers in cymes, or in panicles, or in fascicles. Inflorescences simple, or compound; terminal, or axillary. Flowers pedicellate; medium-sized; regular; 3–5 merous; cyclic; tetracyclic. Perianth with distinct calyx and corolla; 6–10; 2 -whorled; isomerous. Calyx present; (3–)4–5(–6); 1 -whorled; gamosepalous; lobed; lobulate, or toothed. Calyx lobes about the same length as the tube, or markedly shorter than the tube, or markedly longer than the tube. Calyx hairy (puberulent), or glabrous; exceeded by the corolla; regular. Corolla present; 3–5; 1 -whorled; polypetalous; imbricate, or contorted; regular; white, or green, or yellow. Petals elongate. Corolla members entire. Androecial members definite in number. Androecium 7–10(–20). Androecial members free of the perianth; all equal; coherent (filaments connate into a long cylindrical tube); 1 - adelphous; 1 -whorled. Stamens (7–)8–10(–20); all more or less similar in shape; diplostemonous, or polystemonous (rarely). Filaments appendiculate (terminally with 2-lobed free or fused often reflexed appendages). Anthers all alike; basifixed. Gynoecium 3–5(–20) carpelled. The pistil 3–5(–20) celled. Carpels reduced in number relative to the perianth, or isomerous with the perianth (rarely), or increased in number relative to the perianth (rarely). Gynoecium syncarpous; eu-syncarpous; superior. Ovary plurilocular; (3–)5–12(–20) locular. Gynoecium stylate. Styles 1; apical. Stigmas 1; 1(–5) - lobed; ovoid, globose, fusiform, cylindrical, conical, or obconical style-head receptaculum pollinis, less frequently only slightly or not expanded and then capitate or narrowly discoid. Placentation axile. Ovules 2 per locule.

Fruit and seed features. Fruit 14–16 mm long; dehiscent; a capsule. Capsules loculicidal. Dispersal unit the seed. Seeds 1 per locule, or 2 per locule. Seeds thickly endospermic; not compressed (plano-convex); small; arillate. Cotyledons 2; flat. Testa smooth. Seedling. Germination phanerocotylar (Pennington & Styles (1975)).

Geography, cytology, number of species. Adventive. Australian states and territories: Western Australia, or Northern Territory, or Queensland. Northern Botanical Province. 2n=36,50. A genus of 90 species; 1 species in Western Australia; T. pubescens Hellen.; 0 endemic to Western Australia.