Catkin

	Email		Print
	Bookmark		Link

Catkin

A catkin or ament is a slim, cylindrical flower cluster, with inconspicuous or no petals, usually wind

WIND

The Global Geospace Science WIND satellite is a NASA science spacecraft launched at 04:31:00 EST on November 1, 1994 from launch pad 17B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Merritt_Island%2C_Florida, Florida aboard a McDonnell Douglas Delta II 7925-10 rocket....
-pollinated

Pollination

Pollination in flowering plants and gymnosperms is the process that transfers pollen, which contain the male gametes to where the female gamete are contained within the carpel; in gymnosperms the pollen is directly applied to the ovule itself....
(anemophilous

Anemophily

Anemophily or wind pollination is a form of pollination whereby pollen is distributed by wind. Anemophilous plants may be either gymnosperms or angiosperms ....
) but sometimes insect pollinated (as in Salix). They contain many, usually unisexual

Plant sexuality

Plant sexuality covers the wide variety of sexual reproduction systems found across the plant kingdom. This article describes Morphology aspects of sexual reproduction of plants....
flowers, arranged closely along a central stem which is often drooping.

Discussion

Ask a question about 'Catkin'

Start a new discussion about 'Catkin'

Answer questions from other users

Full Discussion Forum

Encyclopedia

A catkin or ament is a slim, cylindrical flower cluster, with inconspicuous or no petals, usually wind

WIND

Pollination

Anemophily

Plant sexuality

Plant

Plants are Life organisms belonging to the Kingdom Plantae. They include familiar organisms such as trees, herbs, bushes, grasses, vines, ferns, mosses, and green algae....
families, including Betulaceae

Betulaceae

Betulaceae, or the Birch Family, includes six genera of deciduous nut -bearing trees and shrubs, including the birches, alders, hazels, hornbeams and hop-hornbeams, numbering about 130 species....
, Fagaceae

Fagaceae

The family Fagaceae, or beech family, comprises about 900 species of both evergreen and deciduous trees and shrubs, which are characterized by alternate simple leaves with pinnate venation, unisexual flowers in the form of catkins, and fruit in the form of cup-like nuts....
, Moraceae

Moraceae

Morus-alba.jpgMoraceae ? often called the mulberry family or fig family ? is a family of flowering plants comprising about 40 genera and over 1000 species....
, and Salicaceae

Salicaceae

Salicaceae is a family of flowering plants. Recent genetics studies by the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group has greatly expanded the circumscription of the family to contain 57 genera....
. For some time, they were believed to be a key synapomorphy

Synapomorphy

In evolutionary biology, a synapomorphy is a derived character state shared by two or more terminal groups and inherited from their most recent common ancestor....
among the proposed Hamamelididae

Hamamelididae

Hamamelididae is a botanical name at the rank of Subclass . A well-known system that used this name is the Cronquist system, although in the disallowed spelling Hamamelidae....
, but it is now believed that this flower arrangement has arisen independently by convergent evolution

Convergent evolution

Convergent evolution describes the acquisition of the same biological trait in unrelated lineages.The wing is a classic example of convergent evolution in action....
on a number of occasions.

In many of these plants only the male flowers form catkins, and the female flowers are single (hazel

Hazel

The hazels are a genus of deciduous trees and large shrubs native to the temperate northern hemisphere. The genus is usually placed in the birch family Betulaceae, though some botanists split the hazels into a separate family Corylaceae.Hazel plants prefer a nice warm, mild,moist climate nothing more nothing less....
, oak

Oak

The term oak can be used as part of the common name of any of about 400 species of trees and shrubs in the genus Quercus , which are listed in the List of Quercus species, and some related genera, notably Lithocarpus....
), a cone (alder

Alder

Alder is the common name of a genus of flowering plants belonging to the birch family . The genus comprises about 30 species of Plant sexuality trees and shrubs, few reaching large size, distributed throughout the North Temperate Zone and in the New World also along the Andes southwards to Argentina....
) or other types (mulberry

Mulberry

Morus or Mulberry is a genus of 10?16 species of deciduous trees native to warm, temperate, and subtropical regions of Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas, with the majority of the species native to Asia....
). In other plants (such as poplar

Poplar

Populus is a genus of between 25?35 species of deciduous flowering plants in the family Salicaceae, native to most of the Northern Hemisphere....
) both male and female flowers are borne in catkins.

Catkin-bearing plants include many other trees or shrub

Shrub

A shrub or bush is a horticulture rather than strictly Botany category of woody plant, distinguished from a tree by its multiple stems and lower height, usually less than 5-6 m tall....
s such as birch

Birch

Birch is the name of any tree of the genus Betula , in the family Betulaceae, closely related to the beech/oak family, Fagaceae....
, willow

Willow

Willows, sallows, and osiers form the genus Salix, around 400 species of deciduous trees and shrubs, found primarily on moist soils in cold and temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere....
, hickory

Hickory

Trees in the genus Carya are commonly known as Hickory. The genus includes 17?19 species of deciduous trees with pinnately compound leaf and large nut ....
, sweet chestnut

Chestnut

Chestnut , is a genus of eight or nine species of deciduous trees and shrubs in the Beech family Fagaceae, native to temperate climate regions of the Northern Hemisphere....
and sweetfern (Comptonia), and also some herbaceous

Herbaceous

A herbaceous plant is a plant that has leaf and stem that die down at the end of the growing season to the soil level. A herbaceous plant may be Annual plant, Biennial plant or Perennial plant....
plants such as nettle

Nettle

Nettle is the common name for between 30-45 species of flowering plants of the genus Urtica in the family Urticaceae, with a cosmopolitan distribution though mainly temperate distribution....
.