Spring Flora of Oklahoma 
33 
FAMILY 15. LORANTHACEiE. Mistletoe Family. 
Parasitic green shrubs or herbs, containing chloro¬ 
phyll, growing on woody plants and absorbing food from 
their sap, through specialized roots called haustoria. 
Leaves opposite. Flowers regular. Fruit a berry. 
I. PHORADE/NDRON Nutt. 
Evergreen, shrubby plants, parasitic on trees (espec¬ 
ially elm in our territory). Branches greenish, jointed, 
and very brittle. Leaves leathery. Flowers dioecious, in 
short, jointed spikes. Staminate flowers globular, calyx 
2-4-lobed, stamens sessile at the base of the lobes, anthers 
transversely 2-celled. Stigma sessile. Berry 2-seeded. 
1. Phoradendron flavesoens (Fursh.) Nutt. American Mistle¬ 
toe. Leaves oblong or obovate. Berry globose, white. May-July. 
FAMILY 16. SANTALACEiE. Sandalwood Family. 
Herbs, shrubs, or trees, with entire leaves. The 4-5- 
cleft calyx valvate in the bud, its tube coherent with the 
1-celled ovary. Ovules 2-4, suspended from the apex of 
a stalk-like free central placenta which rises from the 
base of the cell, but the (indehiscent) fruit always 1- 
seeded. 
I. COMANDRA Nutt. 
Erect, perennial herbs, sometimes growing parasitical- 
ly on the roots of other plants. Stamens 5, rarely 4, in¬ 
serted at the base of the lobes of the campanulate or urn¬ 
shaped calyx, and between the lobes of a fleshy disk. 
Anthers connected to the middle of the calyx lobes by 
tufts of hairs. Globose fruit surmounted by the persist¬ 
ent calyx. 
1. Comandra pallida A. DC. Pale Comandra. Leaves linear or 
linear-lanceolate. Flowers cymose-clustered. Fruit ovoid-oblong. 
In dry soil. Blaine and Comanche counties. April-July. 
