| | Family guide for fruits and seeds |
Common name: Heliconia Family.
Number of genera 1. Number of species 100.
Angiosperm. Liliopsida.
Disseminule an intact or entire fruit.
Fruits
Pistil(s) compound; 1; 1-pistillate; with carpels united. Fruit pericarpium; simple; capsule (schizocarp - Notes); without persistent central column; not within accessory organ(s); more than 1 but less than 10-seeded; (2–)3-seeded; from 1–5 cm long; 1.3–2 cm long; (2–)3-carpellate; with carpels united; with carpels separating at maturity; with carpels not radiating at maturity; with carpels separating at style; without sterile carpels; not sulcate; in transection triangular; apex not beaked; indehiscent. Epicarp blue, or orange, or red, or yellow; durable; glabrous (without hairs); without armature; smooth (assumed); without wing(s); without apical respiratory hole. Mesocarp present; fleshy; composed of 1 unified layer; without lactiform cavity system; and endocarp sharply differentiated. Endocarp present; separating spontaneously from exocarp; bony (blue. orange, red); not splitting into 1-seeded pyrenes (rather a whole fruit splitting into 3 parts); stone unilocular; stone (2–)3-loculate; without wing; without operculum; without secretory cavities; without mechanism for seedling escape; without grooves; without longitudinal ridges. Funiculus short; short without seed bearing hooks (retinacula); not persisting in fruit after seed shed.
Seeds
Aril absent. Seed larger than minute; 10 to less than 25 mm long; 10–17 mm long; triangular; in transection triangular; not bowl shaped; not nutlike; without winglike beak; without caudate appendage(s); at maturity with food reserves; with endosperm, or perisperm; without canavanine. Sarcotesta absent. Testa present; without markedly different marginal tissue; without fleshy or leathery layer over hard layer; tight; surface unsmooth; surface with depressed features, or discreet raised features, or merged raised features; surface deeply & irregularly pitted; surface tuberculate; surface ridged; without crease or line separating cotyledons from hypocotyl-radicle; without notch along margin where cotyledons from hypocotyl-radicle tip approach each other; without glands; without bristles; without wings; without collar; with operculum; colored; monochrome; hard; not becoming mucilaginous when wetted; surrounding food reserve. Hilum larger than punctate. Endosperm copious; smooth; without fatty acid containing cyclopropene; without apical lobes; without chlorophyll; without isodiametric faceted surface; without odor.
Perisperm copious; with starch; opaque. Embryo differentiated from food reserve, or undifferentiated from food reserve (at first); well developed; 1 per seed; partially filling testa (with food reserve); embryo poorly differentiated when seed is first mature; at one end of seed not extending into a depression or cup; basal; foliate; straight; parallel to seed length; embedded in endosperm and embedded in perisperm (how are the endosperm and perisperm layers arranged vis a vis embryo?); with cotyledons gradually connected to hypocotyl-radicle; without coleoptile; without coleorhiza; without simmondsin; without stomata; not green; with 1 cotyledon, or acotyledonous. Cotyledons one and not modified into scutellum; not circinately coiled. Hypocotyl-radicle small to moderately developed; straight; not thickened.
Distribution
New World, Old World. Middle America, South America, Oceania.
Notes
Goldberg did not cover this family. Spjut incorrectly scored (but not scored here) the fruit as a drupe. He is not correct, because he defined a drupe as indehiscent and this fruit breaks into 3 cocci. Spjut quoted Dahlgren et al. "drupe" each of the 3 stones of which contains a single seed. But Mabberley & Cronquist have "fruit a schizocarp splitting into (2-)3, 1-seeded usually blue, fleshy mericarps.
Weed information
No USA noxious weeds.
Listed seeds
No ASOA or ISTA listed seeds.
Accepted genera
Heliconia L., nom. cons.
References specific to this family
Cronquist page 1172.
General references
Cronquist, A. 1981. An integrated system of classification of flowering plants, 1,262 p. Columbia University Press, New York, Gaertner, J. 1788–1805. De fructibus et seminibus plantarum. The Author, Stuttgart, Gunn, C.R. and C.A. Ritchie. 1988. Identification of disseminules listed in the Federal Noxious Weed Act. Techn. Bull. U.S.D.A. 1719:1–313, Gunn, C.R., J.H. Wiersema, C.A. Ritchie, and J.H. Kirkbride, Jr. 1992 and amendments. Families and genera of Spermatophytes recognized by the Agricultural Research Service. Techn. Bull. U.S.D.A. 1796:1–500, Mabberley, D.J. 1987. The plant-book, 706 p. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, Spjut, R.W. 1994. A systematic treatment of fruit types. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 70:1–182.
Illustrations
No fruit and acceptable seed illustration. Cronquist has no illustration. Disseminule illustration(s): seed, or embryo. Seed illustration(s): Gunn & Ritchie, Karen. Embryo illustration(s): Gunn & Ritchie, Karen. Karen's plate number and taxon (taxa): 359: Heliconia latispatha Benth. (A-B).
• Fruit. 1 of 4. Heliconia latispatha Benth.: fruit. • Seed. 2 of 4. Heliconia latispatha Benth.: seed. • Embryo. 3 of 4. Heliconia latispatha Benth.: embryo. • Embryo. 4 of 4. Heliconia psittacorum L. f.: embryo.
We advise against extracting comparative information from the descriptions. This is much more easily achieved using the DELTA data files or the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, and distributions of character states within any set of taxa. See also Guidelines for using data taken from Web publications.
Cite this publication as: ‘J.H. Kirkbride, Jr., C.R. Gunn, and M.J. Dallwitz. 2000 onwards. Family guide for fruits and seeds: descriptions, illustrations, identification, and information retrieval. Version: 12th April 2021. delta-intkey.com’.
