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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.

Key to Morella

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1 Fresh leaves odorless when crushed; staminate flowers with 6-10 stamens (or as few as 3 in distal flowers); leaves usually entire; sessile glands of the leaves and branchlets colorless or white; fruits 4-8 mm in diameter; [of s. GA south and west]
1 Fresh leaves aromatic when crushed; staminate flowers with 3-5 (-7) stamens; leaves usually serrate, at least near the tip; sessile glands of the leaves and branchlets yellow, orange, or reddish; fruits 2-7 mm in diameter; [collectively widespread in our area].
  2 Leaves oblanceolate (generally narrowly so), most of them 0.5-1.5 cm wide, 4-6× as long as wide, evergreen; mature fruits 2.0-3.5 mm in diameter.
    3 Medium shrub to small tree (usually 2-10 m tall), not stoloniferous; leaves of fertile branches 4-9 cm long, 8-20 mm wide, cuneate, not showing differentiation in size towards branch tips; leaf surfaces densely glandular, the glands not giving the upper leaf surface an obvious yellowish or reddish cast; [of a wide range of wetland habitats, including wet Coastal Plain pinelands; also planted and naturalized in upland sites]
    3 Small shrub (usually < 1 m tall), strongly stoloniferous; leaves of fertile branches 1.5-5 cm long, 3-13 mm wide, very narrowly cuneate or attenuate, the leaves near the branch tips reduced in size compared to those lower on the branch; leaf surfaces very densely glandular, the glands giving the upper leaf surface a reddish (ferruginous) or yellow cast; [restricted to Coastal Plain pinelands (or areas formerly so)]
  2 Leaves elliptic to broadly oblanceolate, most of them 1.5-4 (-5.2) cm wide, 2-4× as long as wide, evergreen to deciduous; mature fruits 3.0-7.0 mm in diameter.
      4 Leaves subcoriaceous and more or less evergreen, not revolute (or slightly so if sun-grown), the larger ones usually about 9 cm long and 3.5 cm wide (to 14.2 cm long and 5.5 cm wide), with punctate glands dense on the lower surface and nearly or entirely absent on the upper surface; fruits 3-4.5 mm in diameter, the fruit wall glabrous or sparsely glandular, the warty protuberances glandular; twigs densely hairy to rarely glabrous; older branches blackish; [of various boggy habitats, widespread in our area]
      4 Leaves coriaceous, tardily deciduous, often revolute, the larger ones about 6 cm long and 2 cm wide, with punctate glands fairly dense on both surfaces; fruits 4-6 (-7) mm in diameter, the fruit wall and warty protuberances densely hirsute when young; twigs glabrous to sparsely hairy; older branches whitish gray; [usually of dunes, from Dare County, NC northward]
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