Families

Rhamnaceae

The Rhamnaceae is a large family of temperate and tropical trees and shrubs with some climbers.  It contains about 9000 species in 58 genera.  The leaves are alternate or opposite, simple and with stipules. The flowers are small, inconspicuous, sometimes without petals, bisexual (rarely unisexual), regular and usually bourne in cymes.  The fruits are varying in form according to their means of dispersal.  Some are dry, dehiscent and wind-dispersed, but most are fleshy drupes or nuts, dispersed by the mammals and birds which eat them.

Rhizophoraceae

The rhizophoraceae is a tropical family of shrubs, climbers and trees contains 16 genera and about 120 species.  The leaves are simple and entire, usually opposite and with conspicuous, caducous stipules, rarely alternate and without stipules.  The flowers are bisexual (rarely unisexual), regular, and hypogynous to epigynous, borne in cymes or racemes, rarely solitary, in the leaf axils.    The fruit is a berry or drupe, or dry and indehiscent, rarely a dehiscent capsule or winged; the seeds, sometimes with an aril, and with or without fleshy endosperm.   

Rosaceae

The Rosaceae is a large and important family of woody and herbaceous plants comprised of 122 genera and 3,370 species.  It includes deciduous or evergreen trees, shrubs, shrublets or herbs.   The leaves are alternate (rarely opposite), simple or compound, and typically bear a pair of stipules at the base although these may be difficult to detect or even absent in a few genera.  The flowers are characteristically insect pollinated and frequently large and showy; a high percentage of all species are actual or potential garden ornamentals.  Usually the flowers are regular and bisexual.  The fruits of Rosaceae are very diverse, fleshy or dry, and provide important characters for dividing up the family. 

Rubiaceae

The madder family of the Rubiales order of flowering plants, consisting of about 500 genera with more than 6500 species of herbs, shrubs, and trees, distributed primarily in tropical areas of the world. Members of the family have leaves opposite each other with stipules or in whorls, unbroken leaf margins, and leaf-like appendages at the base of the leafstalks. The leaves usually are large and evergreen in tropical species, deciduous in temperate species, and needle-like or scale-like in desert species. The plants may bear a single flower or many small flowers clustered together.  The flowers are bisexual and regular.  The fruit is a capsule, berry, drupe or schizocarp.  The seeds are sometimes winged; they have straight embryo and endosperm may be preset or absent.

Rutaceae

This family of flowering plants belongs to the order Sapindales and valuable as a source of edible fruit and as ornamentals. Known as the citrus, or rue, family, the Rutaceae includes woody shrubs and trees (and a few herbaceous perennials) and consists of 150 genera and 1700 species distributed throughout the world, especially in warm temperate and tropical regions.  The crushed leaves of the members of this family produce a strong foetid aroma from oil glands, which can be seen as small, translucent black dots on he leaves.  This is the most distinctive feature of the Rutaceae.  The fruits are very variable between different sub families and tribes, being schizocarps, drupes or berries.  The seeds may lack endosperm.