Caturus Loureiro; Cladodes Loureiro; Stipellaria Bentham (1854), not Klotzsch (1848).

Trees or shrubs, dioecious or monoecious; indumentum of simple hairs. Leaves alternate; stipules small, deciduous; leaf blade simple, junction with petiole usually with 2-4 glands, mostly with 2 stipels, margin crenate or dentate; pinnately veined and shortly petiolate or palmately veined and long petiolate. Inflorescences terminal and/or axillary, branched or unbranched, male often axillary, female and bisexual terminal; bracts small, usually with 2 basal glands; flowers sometimes sessile. Male flowers fascicled; calyx closed in bud, 2-5-partite, valvate; petals absent; disk absent; stamens 4-8; filaments shortly connate; anthers 2-locular, introrse; pistillode absent. Female flowers usually 1 per bract; sepals 4-8, imbricate, sometimes 1-4-glandular; ovary 2- or 3-locular; ovules 1 per locule; styles 2 or 3, free or basally connate, simple, usually long. Fruit a capsule, 2- or 3(or 4)-locular, smooth or muricate. Seed globose, usually tuberculate.

About 50 species: tropical and subtropical regions; eight species (three endemic) in China.

(Authors: Qiu Huaxing (丘华兴 Chiu Hua-hsing, Kiu Hua-shing, Kiu Hua-xing); Michael G. Gilbert)