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Common name: Banana Family.
Number of genera 3. Number of species 13.
Angiosperm. Liliopsida.
Disseminule a dehisced fruit, or an intact or entire fruit, or a seed.
Fruits
Pistil(s) compound; 1; 1-pistillate; with carpels united. Fruit pericarpium; simple; pepo (Spjut 4 families: Caricaceae, Cucurbitaceae, Musaceae, & Passifloraceae); without persistent central column; not within accessory organ(s); more than 1 but less than 10-seeded to many-seeded; few to many; 3-carpellate; with carpels united; with carpels remaining united at maturity; without sterile carpels; not sulcate; in transection terete; apex beaked; apex moderately beaked; indehiscent, or dehiscent (somewhat). Dehiscent unit seed(s). Dehiscent irregularly; passively; at partially & irregularly apex; and shedding seeds; without replum. Epicarp yellow, or red, or purple, or black, or orange; dull; durable; leathery; glabrous (without hairs); without armature; not smooth; without wing(s); without apical respiratory hole. Mesocarp present; fleshy, or fibrous; composed of 1 unified layer; without lactiform cavity system. Endocarp absent. Funiculus short; short without seed bearing hooks (retinacula); not persisting in fruit after seed shed.
Seeds
Aril absent, or present (the present answer depends on interpretation of fine blue hair-like structures on Musa spp. seeds); a true aril (albeit rudimentary). Seed larger than minute; 1 to less than 5 mm long to 5 to less than 10 mm long; 6–14 mm long (in diameter); irregular; in transection compressed (& angled); not bowl shaped; not nutlike; without winglike beak; without caudate appendage(s); at maturity with food reserves; with endosperm and perisperm; without canavanine. Sarcotesta absent. Testa present; without fleshy or leathery layer over hard layer; tight; dull; surface smooth, or unsmooth; surface with discreet raised features, or merged raised features; surface papillate; surface reticulate, or roughened; 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; glabrous; without wings; without collar; with operculum; colored; monochrome; blue, or black, or brown (all shades); bony, or thick; not becoming mucilaginous when wetted; surrounding food reserve. Hilum larger than punctate; sunken or not. Endosperm development early nuclear, or cellular (later); copious; mealy; smooth; with starch; with compound starch grains; without fatty acid containing cyclopropene; without apical lobes; without chlorophyll; without isodiametric faceted surface; without odor.
Perisperm copious; mealy; with starch; with compound starch grains; opaque; smooth. Embryo differentiated from food reserve; well developed; 1 per seed; partially filling testa (with food reserve); 0.3 times the length of food reserve; at one end of seed not extending into a depression or cup; peripheral (or within perisperm); straight; lying along one side of endosperm (probably should be perisperm); with cotyledons gradually connected to hypocotyl-radicle; without coleoptile; without coleorhiza; without simmondsin; without stomata; not green; with 1 cotyledon. Cotyledons one and not modified into scutellum; not circinately coiled.
Distribution
Old World. Asia Minor, southeastern Asia, Australia, Oceania (banana is widely cultivated).
Notes
Dahlgren et al.: "Fruit with tough outer skin, which is easily split open longitudinally and with a homogenous inner layer, less commonly fruit is rather dry and much less fleshy".
Weed information
No USA noxious weeds.
Listed seeds
ISTA listed seeds.
ISTA listed seeds: -- Ensete ventricosum (Welw.) Cheesman -- Musa acuminata Colla -- Musa arnoldiana De Wild. = Ensete ventricosum (Welw.) Cheesman -- Musa balbisiana Colla -- Musa cavendishii Lamb. = Musa acuminata Colla -- Musa coccinea Andrews = Musa uranoscopos Lour. -- Musa × paradisiaca L. -- Musa × sapientum L. = Musa × paradisiaca L. -- Musa textilis Nee -- Musa uranoscopos Lour. -- Musa velutina H. Wendl. & Drude -- Symbols: aagricultural and vegetable seeds (Table 2A Part 1); ttree and shrub species (Table 2A Part 2); fflower, spice, herb, and medicinal seeds (Table 2A Part 3); wweed seeds. -- Last updated September 2008.
Accepted genera
Ensete Horan. -- Musa L. -- Musella (Franch.) C. Y. Wu
References specific to this family
Cronquist page 1173. Argent, G.C.G. 1976. The wild bananas of Papua New Guinea. Notes Roy. Bot. Gard. Edinburgh 35:77–114.
General references
Cronquist, A. 1981. An integrated system of classification of flowering plants, 1,262 p. Columbia University Press, New York, Dahlgren, R.M.T., H.T. Clifford and P.F. Yeo. 1985. The families of the monocotyledons, 520 pp. Springer-Verlag, Berlin, Goldberg, A. 1986 (dicots) and 1989 (monocots). Classification, evolution, and phylogeny of the familes of Dicotyledons. Smithsonian Contr. Bot. 58 for dicots (314 pp.) and 71 for monocots (74 pp.). [Goldberg's illustrations are reproduced from older publications and these should be consulted], 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
Acceptable fruit and seed illustrations. Disseminule illustration(s): fruit, or seed, or embryo. Fruit illustration(s): Gaertner, Argent (1976), LeMaout & Decasine, Dahlgren et al. Seed illustration(s): Hooker [1777], Karen, LeMaout & Decaisne. Embryo illustration(s): Karen, Hooker [1777]. Karen's plate number and taxon (taxa): 360: Ensete calospermum (F. Muell.) E.E. Cheesm. (A-B), Ensete (Musa) gilletii (De Wild.) Cheesman (C-D).
• Fruit. 1 of 5. Ensete glaucum (Roxb.) Cheesman: fruit. • Seed. 2 of 5. Ensete glaucum (Roxb.) Cheesman: seed. • Seed. 3 of 5. Musa textilis Née: seeds. • Embryo. 4 of 5. Ensete glaucum (Roxb.) Cheesman: embryo. • Embryo. 5 of 5. Ensete gilletii (De Wild.) Cheesman: 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’.
