BERBERIDACEAE (Barberry Family)
Contributed by
Alan Whittemore
Shrubs or
rhizomatous perennial herbs, stems sometimes spiny. Leaves basal, alternate, or
subopposite, simple or compound. Flowers actinomorphic, perfect, hypogynous;
sometimes with 3–4 bractlets adjacent to the calyx. Calyces of 6 free sepals,
sometimes falling as flowers open. Corollas of 6–9 free petals, these showy or
inconspicuous. Stamens 6–18, free, the anthers opening by apical flaps or
longitudinal slits. Pistil 1 per flower, of apparently 1 carpel. Ovary
superior, with 1 locule, the placentation basal. Style short or absent, the
stigma appearing sessile. Fruits berries or capsules, or the fruit wall rupturing
early in development and the seeds then exposed at maturity. Seeds 1–50 per
fruit. Fifteen genera, about 650 species, North America, Europe, Asia, and the
mountains of South America and east Africa.
The structure of
the pistil in plants of this family is very simple, with a single unlobed
stigma and an ovary having a single locule containing basal ovule(s). It is not
clear whether the pistil is composed of a single carpel, like the pistils of
Ranunculaceae and Menispermaceae, or of several fused carpels, as in
Papaveraceae and Fumariaceae.
In addition to
the five species included here, there are unconfirmed reports of Jeffersonia
diphylla (L.) Pers. (twinleaf) from Missouri. Steyermark (1963) excluded the
species from the flora and did not accept an anecdotal report by B. F. Bush of
a population in a creek bottom in Taney County. More recently, members of the
Webster Groves Nature Study Society have suggested that the species has escaped
from plantings at an estate in Jefferson County. Jeffersonia diphylla,
which superficially resembles Stylophorum diphyllum (Papaveraceae), is a
rhizomatous perennial herb to 30 cm tall with basal leaves having the blades
divided into two asymmetrically ovate or kidney-shaped leaflets 7–12 cm long.
The solitary, long-stalked flowers open while the leaves are expanding, have
white to light pink petals 11–23 mm long, and have stamens with the anthers
attached at the base and opening by longitudinal slits. The fruit is a tough-walled,
ellipsoidal capsule that opens by the loss of a terminal lid. Twinleaf is known
from Illinois and Iowa, and botanists should continue to search for it in
Missouri.