Heteropterys

• Authority

  Maguire, Bassett. 1978. The botany of the Guayana Highland--part XI. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 32: 1-391.

• Family

  Malpighiaceae

• Scientific Name

  Heteropterys

• Description

  
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  Genus Description - Woody vines, shrubs, or small trees, the leaves opposite or very rarely alternate or whorled, usually bearing glands on the lamina or petiole or both, the stipules very small, free, triangular, borne on or beside base of petiole, often apparently absent. Flowers borne in umbels, corymbs, or pseudoracemes, these single or grouped in racemes or panicles, axillary or terminal or both; floriferous peduncle usually developed, absent in some species, subtended by a bract and bearing 2 bracteoles at or below the apex, the bract and/or the bracteoles glanduliferous in some species. Petals mostly yellow or pink, occasionally white, bronze, maroon, or lilac, glabrous in all but a few species. Stamens 10, all fertile, the anthers more or less alike and glabrous in all but a few species, the connective never exceeding the locules. Ovary of 3 carpels partially connate, 1 anterior and 2 posterior, all fertile; styles 3, the apex with a large internal stigma and dorsally rounded, truncate, acute, or hooked. Fruit schizocarpic, breaking apart into 3 samaras (or fewer due to abortion) separating from a short pyramidal torus, each samara having its largest wing dorsal, thickened on the abaxial (lower) edge and (in most species) bent upward, the veins terminating in the thinner adaxial edge; much shorter winglets or crests present on the sides ofthe nut in some species; dorsal wing rudimentary in a few species.

• Discussion

  13. Heteropterys Humboldt, Bonpland & Kunth, Nov. Gen. Sp. PI. 5: 163 (4°ed.). 1821 [1822]. Type. Heteropterys purpurea (L.) H.B.K. This is a difficult genus of perhaps 120 species, with one in Africa (H. leona), the rest occurring from Mexico to Argentina.