4. Callicarpa L. (beautyberry)
Plants shrubs,
incompletely monoecious (producing staminate and apparently perfect but
functionally pistillate flowers in the same inflorescences). Stems several,
loosely ascending to more commonly arched, branched, the bark light brown to
grayish brown, relatively smooth, but with scattered vertically-oriented
lenticels, on the oldest trunks eventually separating into small, thin plates.
Twigs more or less circular to bluntly 4-angled, reddish to purplish brown, sparsely
to densely pubescent with minute, scurfy to woolly, short-stalked, stellate
(dendritic) hairs, these wearing away with age. Winter buds ovoid, angled to a
sharply pointed tip, the usually 2 outer scales obscured by dense stellate
hairs. Leaves opposite or in whorls of 3 at some nodes, shortly to moderately
petiolate (1–35 mm), the petiole winged, at least above the midpoint, with a
pungent, disagreeable odor when crushed. Leaf blades simple, unlobed, narrowly
to broadly ovate, elliptic, oblong-elliptic, or occasionally lanceolate,
tapered at the base, tapered to a sharply pointed tip, the margins with
relatively coarse but sometimes shallow, blunt to sharp teeth, the surfaces
moderately pubescent with mostly stellate hairs when young, sometimes mostly
along the veins, also with inconspicuous, sessile glands, one or both surfaces
becoming glabrous or nearly so at maturity, sometimes the stellate hairs shed
but leaving the minute basal stalks. Inflorescences axillary, dense or open
clusters or small, dome-shaped, dichotomously branched panicles, usually with
numerous flowers, the flowers stalked, the stalk with a pair of bractlets at
the base. Calyces actinomorphic, lacking a lateral projection, symmetric at the
base, cup-shaped to broadly obconic, the tube more or less 4-angled, with
obscure, branched nerves between the angles, very shallowly 4-lobed or
sometimes entire, the lobes similar in size and shape, broadly triangular to
broadly rounded (the margin appearing slightly undulate), not spinescent, not
becoming enlarged at fruiting. Corollas actinomorphic, light pink to pale
purple or blue (rarely reddish-tinged or white), the outer surface with sessile
glands, the tube funnelform, the 4 lobes shorter than to longer than the tube,
rounded to bluntly pointed at the tips and often slightly irregular along the
margins. Stamens 4, present (but not necessarily functional) in all flowers,
exserted, all similar in size, the filaments attached at the base of the
corolla tube, the anthers small, the connective very short, the pollen sacs 2,
parallel, yellow. Ovary present only in functionally pistillate flowers,
unlobed, the style appearing terminal. Style exserted, unbranched at the tip,
the stigma more or less capitate to peltate-flattened. Fruits fleshy, globose
drupes 3–6 mm in diameter, the outer surface purplish red to pinkish purple,
sometimes bluish-tinged, shiny, the stone eventually separating into usually 4
nutlets About 140 species, North America, Central America, South America,
Caribbean Islands, Madagascar, Asia south to Australia.
As noted above, Callicarpa
formerly was classified in the Verbenaceae, but has been transferred to the
Lamiaceae, based on molecular data and a reassessment of the morphological
features separating the family.