A botanical reference guide of morphological terms, plant structures, propagation techniques, and campus flora definitions.
Explore terms organized by botanical structure, morphology, and arboricultural concepts.
Cruciform Cross-shaped. This feature helps describe plant form, function, or identification. Did you know? Broccoli, cabbage, kale, radish, and mustard all belong to a family known for four-petaled, cross-shaped flowers.
Culm The hollow stem of a plant in the grass family. Did you know? Bamboo culms can grow extremely fast, sometimes adding several feet in a single day under ideal conditions.
Cuneate Wedge or triangular-shaped. This feature helps describe plant form, function, or identification.
Cupulate Cup-shaped. This feature helps describe plant form, function, or identification.
Cylindric Shaped like a cylinder - elongated and round in cross section.
Cyme A convex or flat flower cluster, with the central flowers opening first
Cypsela A dry single-seeded, fruit consisting of an achene with a closely adhering calyx sheath, characteristic of the aster family (Asteraceae or Compositae.) Did you know? Each tiny dandelion “parachute” carries a cypsela, a one-seeded fruit of the aster family.
Cystidium A specialized sterile end cell formed anywhere in fungal tissue of a mushroom. It is most commonly found in the hymenial layer of tissue (the surface covering of the gills), but may also be found on the surface of the cap, the surface of the stipe (stem), or even within the sterile tissue of the stipe.
The Purdue Arboretum is a collaboration between the Department of Horticulture and Landscape Architecture and Administrative Operations