Anacardiaceae.
The Cashew family has 70 to 82 genera with around 850 to 950 species.
Fifteen species from 10 genera are found in Australia.
They are trees or shrubs with some woody vines and rarely herbs.
Parts may have latex or gums.
The mostly alternate leaves are spirally arranged and often clustered near the branch ends giving the
appearance of being in whorls. Occasionally the leaves are opposite.
Some have simple leaves but they are mostly pinnate or trifoliate.
Terminal or axillary inflorescences are branched clusters of flowers with the lower ones on each
branch opening first (panicles).
The small flowers are bi- or uni-sexual.
Flowers are on a stalk or pedicel with a large or small bract that may be fused to it.
The calyx commonly has 5 (3) sepals usually with their bases fused.
The corolla has 5 (3, 0) petals, usually longer than the sepals that are free or fused at the base.
The sepals and petals may fall off or persist on the fruit.
Bisexual flowers have 4 to 10 (1 to many) stamens that are almost always free.
Only 1 may be fertile with the others reduced to infertile staminodes.
They can insert on either side of the nectiferous disc.
The dorsi or basi-fixed anthers open inwards through longitudinal slits.
The usually distinct fleshy nectiferous disc can be round, flat or cup-like and have 5 (10) lobes.
Sometimes it is a stalk-like gynophore holding the ovary.
The ovary is usually superior but may be half or fully inferior.
Of 5 (1, 3, 12) mostly fused carpels it typically has 1 locule containing 1 ovule with apical (basal) placentation.
There is usually 1 style but there may be 5 to 12 that are separate or fused.
The fruit are commonly a drupe with a fleshy layer around a hard coated seed.
Mabberley divides Anacardiaceae into two subfamilies of trees and shrubs.
Anacardioideae with simple to multifoliate leaves and an ovary with 1 (3) locule.
It has 60 genera including Mangifera and Schinus.
Spondioideae usually with pinnate leaves and an ovary with 4 or 5 (1) locule.
J.F.
