Alectryon
Content
Description
Medium-sized to small trees or shrubs, sometimes monoecious.
Branchlets terete.
Leaves paripinnate, 1-8-jugate, unwinged;
Inflorescences axillary (or together pseudo-terminal, rarely ramiflorous), a thyrse or panicle (or raceme).
Flowers unisexual (or bisexual), actinomorphic.
Sepals 4, 5 (or 6), from somewhat less than halfway to nearly completely connate, all equal, hardly or not petaloid, hairy on both sides (or inside glabrous).
Petals absent or 4 or 5, about as long as to shorter than the sepals, short-clawed, with 2 scales without a crest, outside glabrous, margin ciliolate, inside hairy or glabrous.
Stamens (5-)8, exserted in male flowers;
Ovules 1 per locale.
Fruits sessile or short-stipitate, 1- or more-lobed, capsular, dehiscing either with a loculicidal calyptra or septifragally (along septum), smooth or slightly warty, hairy or finally glabrous, inside glabrous (or hairy).
Seeds black, partly covered by a red sarcotesta (see under the subgenera).
Distribution
Australasia, E Malesia present, New Caledonia present, New Hebrides present, New Zealand present, Pacific: Fiji (Fiji present); Samoa (Samoa present), Sandwich Islands present, Solomon Islands present
About 25 species in E Malesia, Australia, New Zealand, New Caledonia, New Hebrides, Solomon Islands, Fiji, Samoa, and Sandwich Islands.