Plants & Trees Encyclopedia

Poison Hemlock — Poison Hemlock, Conium is a genus of two species of perennial herbaceous flowering plants in the family Apiaceae, native to Europe and the Mediterranean region (C. maculatum), and to southern Africa (C. chaerophylloides). By far the most familiar species is Conium maculatum (Hemlock or Poison Hemlock), the most common of several species of hemlock noted for their …

Plum — A plum or gage is a stone fruit tree in the genus Prunus, subgenus Prunus. The subgenus is distinguished from other subgenera (peaches, cherries, bird cherries, etc) in the shoots having a terminal bud and the side buds solitary (not clustered), the flowers being grouped 1-5 together on short stems, and the fruit having a groove running down …

Plan Tree, London — The London Plane or Hybrid Plane (Platanus × hispanica, synonyms Platanus × acerifolia and Platanus × hybrida) is a tree in the genus Platanus. It is usually thought to be a hybrid of the Oriental Plane, P. orientalis, with the American Plane (American sycamore), P. occidentalis. Some authorities think that it may be a cultivar of …

Pistachio — The pistachio (Pistacia vera L., Anacardiaceae; sometimes placed in Pistaciaceae) is a small tree up to 10 m tall, native to mountainous regions of Iran, Turkmenistan and western Afghanistan. It has deciduous pinnate leaves 10–20 cm long. The plants are dioecious, with separate male and female trees. The flowers are apetalous and unisexual, and borne in panicles. The …

Pineapple — The pineapple (Ananas comosus) is a tropical plant and fruit (multiple), native to Uruguay, Brazil, Puerto Rico, or Paraguay. It is a medium tall (1–1.5 m) herbaceous perennial plant with 30 or more trough-shaped and pointed leaves 30–100 cm long, surrounding a thick stem. The pineapple is an example of a multiple fruit: multiple, spirally-arranged flowers along the …

Poinsettia — Poinsettias (Euphorbia pulcherrima) are flowers of Mexican origin, native to the Pacific coast of the United States, some parts of central and southern Mexico (including the Mexican Pacific coast), and a few localities in Guatemala. They are named after Joel Roberts Poinsett, the first United States Ambassador to Mexico (technically first U.S. envoy to Mexico), who introduced the …

Pine, Red — The Red Pine (Pinus resinosa) is a pine native to northeastern North America, occurring from Newfoundland west to southeast Manitoba, and south to northern Illinois and Pennsylvania, with a small outlying population in the Appalachian Mountains in West Virginia. In the Upper Midwest of the United States it is sometimes known by the confusing name Norway Pine …

Philodendron — Philodendron is a large genus of flowering plants from the arum family (Araceae), consisting of close to 1000 or more species according to TROPICOS (a service of the Missouri Botanical Garden). Taxonomically it is still poorly known with many undescribed species. Many are grown as ornamental and indoor plants. The name derives from the Greek philo or “love” …

Petunia — Petunia is a, trumpet shaped, widely-cultivated genus of flowering plants of South American origin, in the family Solanaceae. The popular flower got its name from French, which took the word petun ‘tobacco’ from a Tupi-Guarani language. Most of the varieties seen in gardens are hybrids (Petunia x hybrida). The origin of P. x hybrida is thought the be …

Persimmon — A Persimmon is a fruit of a number of species of trees of the genus Diospyros in the ebony wood family (Ebenaceae), and the edible fruit borne by them. The word persimmon is derived from putchamin, pasiminan, or pessamin, from Powhatan, an Algonquian language (related to Blackfoot, Cree and Mohican) of the eastern United States, meaning “a dry …