Equisetaceae
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Description: General description of this family of terrestrial, herbaceous, homosporous vascular plants, comprising a single genus with about 15 species. Includes photos of several Equisetum species.
Non-Flowering Plant Families, UH Botany Equisetophyta (Arthrophyta). The Equisetaceae are terrestrial, herbaceous, homosporous vascular plants comprising a single genus with about 15 species. The free-living sporophytic plant body consists of a rhizome with adventitious roots, and an aerial portion with ribbed, silicified stems that are hollow except at the jointed nodes which bear whorls of reduced scalelike megaphyllous leaves, sometimes alternating with branches. Clusters of 5-10 eusporagia hang from the margins of umbrellalike sporangiophores that are aggregated into a compact strobilus at the tip of the shoot axis. In some species the fertile shoots have little chlorophyll and may also be differentiated from the vegetative shoots in other ways. The spores have 4 straps of tissue called elaters that uncoil from the wall and extend in response to a decrease in humidity, thereby facilitating spore dispersal. The free-living bisexual or male gametophytes are irregularly lobed, tiny ribbonlike photosynthetic structures, often found on the surface of mud. Multiflagellated sperm produced in an antheridium must travel through a film of water in order to reach the egg of an archegonium and initiate the zygote that may develop into a new sporophyte individual.
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WEBSITE Info
| Page title: | Non-Flowering Plant Families, UH Botany |
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| IP-address: | 128.171.224.100 |
WHOIS Info
| NS | Name Servers: DNS1.HAWAII.EDU 128.171.3.13 DNS2.HAWAII.EDU 128.171.1.1 |
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| Date | activated: 27-Oct-1986 last updated: 24-May-2011 expires: 31-Jul-2014 |