苦木属 ku mu shu

Trees with bitter bark. Branches with a pith, glabrous. Leaves odd-pinnate; base of petiole or petiolule often dilated into a pulvinus that withers when dry; stipules early deciduous or persistent; leaflets opposite or nearly so; blades entire or serrate. Inflorescences axillary, cymose panicles. Flowers unisexual or polygamous, 4- or 5-merous; subtending bracts small or early deciduous; pedicel with lower half articulated. Sepals small, free or lower half connate, persistent. Petals valvate or nearly valvate in bud, apex shortly incurved, cuspidate, longer than sepals, persistent in females. Stamens 4 or 5, inserted at base of disk. Disk slightly thickened, entire or shallowly 4- or 5-lobed, sometimes dilate in fruit. Carpels 2-5, free, degenerate or rudimentary in males, each with a single ovule; style connate basally, apex free; stigma free. Fruit comprising one or more drupelike monocarps (each a druparium); exocarp thin, fleshy, wrinkled when dry; endocarp bony. Seeds with a broad hilum, exalbuminous; testa membranous, slightly thick and hard.

About nine species: tropical and subtropical America and Asia; two species (one endemic) in China.

Lower Taxa

• Picrasma chinensis P. Y. Chen
• Picrasma quassioides (D. Don) Bennett
• Picrasma quassioides var. glabrescens Pampanini
• Picrasma quassioides var. quassioides