MORACEAE 
61 
URTICACEAE. NETTLE FAMILY 
Mostly herbs. Leaves simple, alternate or opposite. Flowers uni¬ 
sexual, regular, wind-pollinated. • Sepals 4 or 5. Stamens as many and 
opposite the sepals, uncoiling elastically. Ovary 1-celled, 1-ovuled. Style 
1. Fruit an achene or drupe. Seeds basal, orthotropous. — About 500 
species, mainly in the tropics. 
1. URTICA L. Nettle 
Herbs with stinging hairs. Leaves opposite. Flowers in racemose, 
spiked or head-like clusters. (Latin name of the nettle.) 
1. U. gracilis Ait. var. holosericea Jepson. Creek Nettle. Peren¬ 
nial; stem 11.5 to 28 dm. high; leaves long-ovate to lanceolate, pubes¬ 
cent, lower surface gray, 7.2 to 12 cm. long; flowers sessile, in spikes, 
the pistillate in axils above the staminate.—Along creeks and in damp 
spots; throughout Cal. 
2. U. urens L. Small Nettle. Annual: stem 2.8 to 4.3 dm. high: 
leaves elliptic to ovate, 1.2 to 3.6 cm. long, dark green; flowers more or 
less pediceled, the staminate and pistillate together in the same clusters.— 
Waste places, nat. from Eur. 
MORACEAE. MULBERRY FAMILY 
Trees or shrubs generally with milky juice. Leaves alternate. Flowers 
unisexual, arranged in catkin-like or head-like clusters. Calyx-segments 
generally 4. Stamens 4. Ovary 1 (or rarely 2)-celled; ovule pendulous. 
Stigmas 2.—About 300 species, exclusively in warmer climates. Famous 
plants in the family are the Bread-fruit Tree (Artocarpus incisa L.) of 
the South Sea Islands, India Rubber Tree (Ficus elastica Roxb.) of 
India, and Paper Mulberry (Broussonetia papyrifera Vent.) from which 
Japanese rice paper is made. 
Flowers of the two kinds in separate inflorescences ; filaments incurved in the bud ; 
leaves folded in the bud. 
Flowers usually monoecious, the pistillate in catkin-like spikes; branches not 
armed ...1. Morus. 
Flowers dioecious, the pistillate in a large spherical head; branches with 
axillary thorns.2. Maclura. 
Flowers of both kinds mixed on the inside of a closed fleshy receptacle ; filaments 
straight in the bud; leaves convolute in the bud.3. Ficus. 
1. MORUS L. Mulberry 
Trees. Leaves cordate or ovate, mostly serrate, often palmately lobed. 
Flowers monecious, in short pendulous axillary catkins. Pistillate 
flowers with one 2-celled ovary, the 4 calyx-lobes adherent to the ovary, 
becoming fleshy and cohering into a long multiple fruit like a blackberry 
in appearance. (Latin name.) 
1. M. nigra L. Black Mulberry. Tree 7 to 14 m. high; leaves 
dark dull green, commonly very rough above, usually not lobed; fruit 
large and sweet, black or very dark colored.—Cult, from Persia. 
2. MACLURA Nutt. Bow-wood 
Trees. Leaves entire, slender-petioled. Pistillate flowers crowded in 
catkin-like spikes or heads, which become fleshy in fruit, resembling an 
