响盒子属 xiang he zi shu

Authors: Bingtao Li & Hans-Joachim (Hajo) Esser

Trees, branching usually in whorls; trunk and branches spiny; indumentum of simple, multicellular hairs; white latex present. Leaves alternate; stipules large, caducous; petioles 2-glandular at apex; leaf blade subentire or undulate-serrulate, pinnately veined. Plants monoecious. Inflorescences terminal or axillary, unbranched, elongate. Male flowers in terminal, long pedunculate catkin; bracts not glandular, united into membranous sheath around bud, afterward irregularly lobed; calyx membranous, shallowly cup-shaped, truncate or slightly serrulate; petals absent; disk absent; stamens (8-)10-20, several-seriate; filaments and connectives united into a stout column, theca free, extrorse, longitudinally dehiscent; pistillode absent. Female flowers solitary, axillary; pedicel long; calyx leathery, broadly cup-shaped, truncate at apex; petals absent; disk absent; ovary 5-20-celled; ovules 1 per locule; styles fused into prominent, fleshy column; stigmas united into large umbrella-shaped lobed disk. Fruit a large, oblate schizocarp, depressed at apex, breaking up into laterally compressed woody mericarps. Seeds laterally compressed, smooth; caruncle absent; endosperm fleshy; cotyledon rounded and flattened.

Two or three species: tropical America, also widely cultivated; one species (introduced) in China.

Lower Taxon

• Hura crepitans Linnaeus