Abstract
ABORTION of the stamens in some portion of the flowers occurs in different species of the genus Diantbus. D. superbus has been shown to be gynodiœcious in my work on “Alpenblumen” (p. 202, Fig. 79). D. deltoides, the only species growing near Lippstadt, has lately been examined by myself, and has been found under certain circumstances to become gynomonœcious and gynodiœcious. Of D. Carthusianorum among 167 flowering stalks sent me from Thuringia by my brother, Wilhelm Müller, there were two producing female flowers with greatly aborted stamens. D. deltoides near Lippstadt offers interesting gradations from hermaphroditism to gynodiœcism. On the border of a meadow of some hundred stems examined by myself, all flowers, without exception, proved proterandrous, with normal development of anthers and stigmas. In the grass-grown slope of a sandy hill (“die Weinberge”) likewise all stems produce proterandrous flowers, but on many stems the stamens, although emerging above the petals before the development of the styles and stigmas, bear diminished, whitish anthers not opening at all, and containing only some shrivelled pollen grains. Lastly, in a barren sabulous locality (“Schützenplatz”) many of the stems produce female flowers, with stamens aborted in the same degree as shown in D. superbus (“Alpenblumen”, Fig. 79 D), and not unfrequently such female flowers and proterandrous hermaphrodite ones are found on the same stem.
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MÜLLER, H. Gradations between Hermaphroditism and Gynodiœcism. Nature 24, 532 (1881). https://doi.org/10.1038/024532a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/024532a0
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