Ephedra.| CXXVIII. GNETACEH (Pearson). 329 
opposite, sometimes whorled, free or connate bracts. Envelope of 
2 median scales connate below. Anthers 8 or less, sessile or sub- 
sessile on the summit of a central column, 2- (rarely 3-) celled. 
Female florets in much reduced spikes with 2-4 or more pairs (or 
3-nate whorls) of crowded bracts, solitary in the axils of the uppermost 
2 (or 3) bracts, more rarely only one and terminal. Utricle ovoid 
to oblong, rarely subulate, usually plano-convex in cross-section. 
Ovule with 1 integument; micropylar tube (tubillus) produced 
through the mouth of the utricle, straight or spirally coiled, truncate, 
lobed or toothed at the apex. Seed closely invested by the leathery 
utricle, in the section Pseudobaccate enclosed in the fleshy inner 
bracts of the spike; endosperm fleshy ; perisperm scanty ; radicle 
erect ; cotyledons 2, very narrow.—Erect or climbing, usually 
much branched, virgate shrubs with scale-like or rarely filiform 
or subulate connate leaves in alternating whorls of 2, rarely 
3 or 4, sometimes reduced to sheaths. Stems slender, longi- 
tudinally grooved, green when young. Fertile shoots usually much 
branched in the male, less so in the female. Spikes unisexual, 
rarely bisexual, axillary, solitary, subsolitary or, in the male, 
usually aggregated in dense glomerules, near the tips of the 
branches. 
Species 30 or more, widely distributed in Centra] and Western Asia, the 
Mediterranean Region, Atlantic Islands, Southern States of North America, 
the Andes from Ecuador southwards to Patagonia and the Eastern Argentine. 
One species only in Tropical Africa. 
1. E. Alte, C. A. Mey. Monogr. Gatt. Ephedra (1846), 75, i. ii. 
fig.iv. A shrub, climbing high among trees, or erect, much branched. 
Branchlets flexuous or rigid, terete or the younger more or less 4- 
angled or bilateral, in the male plant usually 13-2 lin. thick, in the 
female rarely exceeding 1} lin. with internodes up to 2} in. long or 
much shorter, more or less crowded in false whorls in the upper 
nodes. Bark glaucous or yellowish-green, scabridulous, very faintly 
striate. Buds terminal or lateral, minute, shortly ovate. Leaves 
in whorls of 2 or 3, linear-setaceous, acute, }-4 lin. broad, 1} lin. long, 
connate at the base. Male spikes subsolitary or 2-4, crowded in 
glomerules, obovate or oblong, 24-3 lin. long, with 4-8 pairs (rarely 
3-nate whorls) of florets ; peduncles very unequal in length ; bracts 
broadly ovate or rotund, obtuse, connate from one-third to half 
their length, 1 lin. long. Envelope obovate, exceeding the bract ; 
column far exserted, often black at the apex; anthers usually 4, 
rarely 3 or 5, sessile, closely crowded. Female spikes solitary or 
fascicled, clustered or racemosely arranged, with 3 or 4 pairs of bracts. 
Florets 2 or, by abortion, 1; utricle oblong, 3-angled ; micropylar 
tube straight. Mature spike globose, up to 3 lin. long, red, with 
fleshy bracts. Seeds black, ovate, obtusely 3-angled, 4 lin. long.— 
