GLOSSARY  V - Z

Vaginate - sheathed or surrounded by a sheath.

Valvate - leaf buds not overlapping; meeting at edges.

Valve - one of the sections when a capsule splits open.

Vascular - plants with ducts or hollow vessels that transport water and food throughout the plant.

Velutinous - velvety surface.

Venation - how the leaf veins are arranged.

Ventral - the upper surface of a leaf.

Ventricose - swelling of a plant structure unequally on one side.

Vermiculite - an inert mica compound used for seed germination and soil mix.

Vernal - appearing in the spring.

Vernation - the arrangement of folded leaves in a leaf bud.

Verrucose - covered with warts.

Verticillate - occurring in a whorl.

Vesicle - a little bladder or sac.

Villous - with long and soft hairs.

Viscid - sticky and gluey.

                             GLOSSARY W

Waterlogged - usually referring to soil - when soil is saturated with water and drains poorly.

Weed - a plant that is undesirable, usually unattractive  or of no value, growing where it is not wanted.

Whorl - an arrangement of three or more leaves or petals arranged in a circle at same location on the stem or node.

Wilding - a plant that is growing wild or has escaped from cultivation.

Wilt - when a plant appears flaccid from lack or water; or from attack by a wilt-causing fungus or bacteria.

Wing - a membranous or a thin and dry appendage of a plant structure.
                                          
Witches - broom - an abnormal growth of  branches or shoots of a tree resulting in the appearance of a weak cluster or matted mass of shoots. This condition is usually due to infection by a fungal pathogen or virus.
   

Wooly - covered with long and matted or tangled hairs.

                           GLOSSARY X

Xeromorphic - special structural adaptations of plant parts characteristic of xerophytes to hold moisture, such as swollen, bulbous stems or leaves.

Xerophyte - plant that grows in an environment devoid of moisture.

Xerophilous - a plant that can thrive in a hot, dry environment.

                             GLOSSARY Y
 

Yeast - a unicellular fungus of the genus Saccharomyces, used in fermentation.

Yield - amount of crop produced from agricultural land.

                             GLOSSARY Z
 

Zoochore - a plant whose seeds are dispersed by animals.

Zoophilous - flowers pollinated by animals, example some Pandanus sp. are pollinated by fruit-eating bats.

Zoospore - a motile asexual spore with flagella (or flagellae) of some fungi and algae sp.

Zoosporangium - a structure in which zoospores develop.

Zygospore - a thick-walled resting spore of some fungi and algae.

Zygote - cell formed by the union of a female and a male gamete.

                                         Home