Home › S › Simarubeae (Natural order of scentless)

Simarubeae (Natural order of scentless)

A natural order of scentless shrubs or trees, often small, mostly inhabiting tropical and warm regions. Flowers diclinous or polygamous, rarely hermaphrodite, regular, usually small; calyx three to five-lobed or parted; petals three to five, very rarely wanting, imbricated or valvate; stamens inserted at the base of a hypogynous disk, as many, or twice as many, as the petals, rarely indefinite; inflorescence usually axillary, paniculate or racemose, rarely spicate or a solitary flower. Fruit a drupe, capsule, or samara. Leaves alternate or rarely opposite, pinnate, rarely one to three-foliolate or simple, not dotted, very rarely glandular; stipules wanting. Bark often bitter, sometimes very much so. The Simaruba of the druggist is yielded by the bark and trunk of Simarouba amara and S. guianensis. Balanites aegyptiaca bears drupes which, when old, are edible. The order comprises thirty-one genera, and about 112 species. Examples: Balanites, Quassia, Simaba, Simarouba.