X
Keyed in multiple places:

Click the number at the start of a key lead to highlight both that lead and its corresponding lead. Click again to show only the two highlighted leads. Click a third time to return to the full key with the selected leads still highlighted.

Click images to enlarge and show more photo credit.

Key to Malpighiaceae

Malpighiaceae

Copy permalink to share

1 Plant in flower.
  2 Styles 1 (-2).
    3 Larger leaf blades 10-16 cm long; petals densely sericeous on the outer (lower) surface; petals at least in part white or pink; plants lianas
    3 Larger leaf blades 1.2.5 cm long; petals glabrous; petals (all of them) yellow to orange; plants herbs or subshrubs
      4 Petals yellow (sometimes aging to orange)
        5 Shrub to 1 m tall
      4 Petals pink, lavender, red, white (or combinations of those).
          6 Shrubs or small trees; [s. FL or s. TX]
             7 Flowers in terminal racemes; leaves lacking glands, the margins entire
             7 Flowers in axillary umbels or corymbs; undersurfaces of leaves with (0-) 2-4 glands; leaf blade margin prickly (M. coccigera) or entire (M. emarginata)
1 Plant in fruit.
                 9 Flowers in axillary umbels or corymbs; undersurfaces of leaves with (0-) 2-4 glands; leaf blade margin prickly (M. coccigera) or entire (M. emarginata)
               8 Fruits schizocarps, breaking apart into samaras, nutlets (unwinged), or cocci.
                   10 Mericarps nutlets or cocci (not winged but with a dorsal crest or keel); plants not lianas (herbs, subshrubs, or shrubs).
                       12 Samaras with 3 elongate lateral wings; larger leaf blades 10-16 cm long
                       12 Samaras with 1 elongate lateral wing and 2 small crests; larger leaf blades 4-10 cm long.
                          13 Leaf blades 1.1-1.6× as long as wide; stems with white lenticels; secondary veins of the leaf blades obscure (not impressed)
                          13 Leaf blades 1.8-3× as long as wide; stems with brown lenticels; secondary veins of the leaf blades apparent and impressed on the upper surface