Common Name: TAMARISK FAMILY
Habit: Shrub, tree, much-branched. Stem: trunk bark rough. Leaf: alternate, sessile, entire, often scale-like, generally with salt-excreting glands. Inflorescence: [spike], raceme, compound raceme, [flowers 1]; bracts scale-like. Flower: sepals 4--5, generally free, overlapping; petals 4--5, free, overlapping, generally attached below nectary; stamens 4--5[many], attached below or to nectary; ovary superior, 1-chambered, placentas basal or parietal, intrusive (simulating chambers) or not, ovules 2--many; styles [0,2]3--4[5]. Fruit: capsule, loculicidal. Seed: many, hairy.
Genera In Family: +- 4 genera, 80 species: Eurasia, Africa. Note: Often in saline habitats.
eFlora Treatment Author: John F. Gaskin
Scientific Editor: Thomas J. Rosatti.

Common Name: TAMARISK, SALTCEDAR
Stem: young stems often +- pendent, slender, +- covered by leaves, hairy or glabrous. Leaf: small, awl- or scale-like, sessile, generally +- clasping stem, generally encrusted with excreted salt. Inflorescence: raceme or compound raceme on current or previous year's twigs; bract generally +- clasping. Flower: sepals 4--5, generally +- united at base, persistent; petals 4--5, free, deciduous to persistent, white, pink, red; stamens 4--5[15], free; nectary disk lobes 4--5[15], alternate or confluent with filaments; styles 3--4. Fruit: valves +- lanceolate. Seed: hairs in tuft at tip, > seed.
Species In Genus: +- 60 species: Eurasia, Africa. Etymology: (Latin: Tamaris River, Spain) Note: Invasive weeds with deep roots, especially along streams, irrigation canals. Most California species originally cultivated for ornamental, windbreaks; some hybridize. Tamarix africana Poir. excluded.
Reference: Beauchamp et al. 2005 Pl & Soil 275:221--231
Unabridged Reference: Baum 1967 Baileya 15:19--25; Beauchamp et al. 2005 Pl & Soil 275 (1--2):221--231; Di Tomaso 1998 Weed Technology 12:326--336