Common Name: SPURGE FAMILY Habit: Annual to shrub, tree [vine, cactus-like succulent]; monoecious or dioecious; sap clear or milky. Stem: generally branched [fleshy or spiny]. Leaf: generally simple, alternate to whorled, generally stipuled, sessile or petioled; blade entire, toothed, or lobed. Inflorescence: flowers solitary or in terminal or axillary cymes, racemes, spikes, or panicles, or (in Euphorbia) 1° inflorescence a compact, flower-like cyathium with much-reduced flowers enclosed within an involucre of fused bracts, cyathia terminal or axillary, 1 or in cyme-like arrays. Flower: unisexual, +- radial; sepals 0 or 2--6, free or fused; petals generally 0(5); stamens 1--many, free or filaments fused; ovary superior, chambers (1)3(4), styles free or fused, undivided, forked, or variously lobed. Fruit: generally capsule that splits into mericarps that then dehisce, releasing seeds. Seed: 1 per chamber; knob-like appendage sometimes present at attachment scar. Genera In Family: 217 genera, 6000+ species: +- worldwide especially tropics; some cultivated (Aleurites, tung oil; Euphorbia species; Hevea, rubber; Ricinus). Toxicity: Many species +- highly TOXIC, due primarily to latex, especially if eaten or in contact with skin, eyes. Note:Eremocarpus moved to Croton, Tetracoccus moved to Picrodendraceae for TJM2; Chamaesyce moved to Euphorbia here (key to genera revised by Thomas J. Rosatti). eFlora Treatment Author: Mark H. Mayfield & Grady L. Webster, except as noted Scientific Editor: Bruce G. Baldwin.
Common Name: TALLOWTREE Habit: Tree [shrub]; sap milky; monoecious. Stem: branches slender, glabrous. Leaf: cauline, alternate; petiole tip with adaxial pair of large, +- spheroid glands; blade entire, adaxially glabrous, abaxially papillate-glaucous, with 0--few glands near margins. Inflorescence: spike-like panicles or racemes, terminal or axillary, elongate, yellow-green; bracts 1--2 mm, with pair of large glands; pedicels 2--3 mm in ours; pistillate flowers basal, 1/bract; staminate flowers distal or throughout, generally 5--8/bract. Staminate Flower: sepals 3, fused; stamens 2 or 3, filaments generally < 1 mm; nectary disk 0. Pistillate Flower: sepals 3, fused; nectary disk 0; ovary 3-chambered, styles 3, fused proximally, simple. Fruit: +- spheric or +- 3-lobed, smooth. Seed: +- white, often staying attached to persistent fruit axis. Etymology: (Greek: 3, for lobes of calyx, ovary, fruit) eFlora Treatment Author: Bruce G. Baldwin Reference: Bower et al. 2009 Inv Pl Sci Managem 2:386--395; Esser 2002 Harvard Pap Bot 7:17--21
Citation for this treatment: Bruce G. Baldwin 2012, Triadica sebifera, in Jepson Flora Project (eds.) Jepson eFlora, https://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/eflora/eflora_display.php?tid=46917, accessed on April 16, 2024.
Citation for the whole project: Jepson Flora Project (eds.) 2024, Jepson eFlora, https://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/eflora/, accessed on April 16, 2024.
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(Note: any qualifiers in the taxon distribution description, such as 'northern', 'southern', 'adjacent' etc., are not reflected in the map above, and in some cases indication of a taxon in a subdivision is based on a single collection or author-verified occurence).
Data provided by the participants of the
Consortium of California Herbaria.
MAP LEGEND View all CCH records All markers link to CCH specimen records. The original determination is shown in the popup window.
Blue markers indicate specimens that map to one of the expected Jepson geographic subdivisions (see left map). Purple markers indicate specimens collected from a garden, greenhouse, or other non-wild location.
Yellow markers indicate records that may provide evidence for eFlora range revision or may have georeferencing or identification issues.
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CCH collections by month
Duplicates counted once; synonyms included.
Species do not include records of infraspecific taxa, if there are more than 1 infraspecific taxon in CA.
Blue line denotes eFlora flowering time (fruiting time in some monocot genera).
