| term | definition | image |
| Bast bundles | bundles of thick-walled cells parallel to the midrib, as in Isoetes | |
| Beak | Persistent stylar base on fruit | |
| Beard | A tuft, line or zone of trichomes | g-beard.png |
| Bearded | With long trichomes usually in a tuft, line or zone | g-beard.png |
| Bent | Foliate embryo with expanded and usually thick cotyledons in an axile position bent upon the hypocot... | g-bent.png |
| Berry | A fleshy fruit that does not split open at maturity (indehiscent), with few or more seeds (rarely ju... | g-berry.png |
| Bibacca | A fused double berry, as in Lonicera | |
| Bicarpellate | Two-carpelled | |
| Bicrenate | With smaller rounded teeth on larger rounded teeth | |
| Bidentate | Two-toothed | |
| Biduous | Lasting two days | |
| Biennial | Normally living two years; germinating or forming and growing vegetatively during one cycle of seaso... | |
| Biferous | Appearing twice yearly | |
| Bifid | Cut or divided into two lobes or parts | |
| Biflorous | Flowering in autumn as well as in spring | |
| Bifoliate | Two-leaved. | |
| Bifoliolate | Compound with two leaflets; two-leafleted or geminate. (Compare with bigeminate and trifoliolate.) | g-bifoliolate.png |
| Bifurcate | Divided into two forks or branches | |
| Bigeminate | With two orders of leaflets, each divided into pairs or geminately compound; doubly paired. (Compare... | g-bigeminate.png |
| Bijugate | With two orders of leaflets, each bifoliolate; doubly paired. | |
| Bilabiate | Two-lipped, with two unequal divisions | g-bilabiate.png |
| Bilateral | With floral parts in two symmetrical halves | |
| Bilaterally symmetric | Divisible into two essentially equal portions along only one plane. (Compare with asymmetric and rad... | |
| Bilocular | Two-locular | |
| Bimestrial | Periodicity: occurring every two months; duration: lasting two months | |
| Binate | Twinned | |
| Bipalmate | Twice palmate | g-bipalmate.png |
| Bipalmately compound | With two orders of leaflets, each palmately compound; twice palmately compound. (Compare with once p... | g-bipalmate.png |
| Bipinnate | Twice pinnate; with the divisions again pinnately divided. | g-bipinnate.png |
| Bipinnate-pinnatifid | Twice pinnately compound with pinnatifid leaflets. (Compare with once pinnate-pinnatifid and tripinn... | |
| Bipinnately compound | With two orders of leaflets, each pinnately compound; twice pinnately compound. (Compare with once p... | g-bipinnate.png |
| Bipinnately lobed | With two orders of leaf lobing, each pinnately lobed; twice pinnately lobed. (Compare with once pinn... | |
| Biseriate | Two-rowed; in two series | |
| Biserrate | With sharply cut teeth on the margins of larger sharply cut teeth | |
| Bisexual | Having functional reproductive structures of both sexes (i.e. male and female) in the same flower or... | |
| Biternate | With two orders of leaflets, each divided into threes or ternately compound; twice trifoliolate. (Co... | g-biternate.png |
| Blade | The flat, expanded portion of a leaf, petal, sepal, etc. | |
| Blade-like | Expanded and flattened, as the main portion or blade of a broad leaf. (Compare with glandular, scale... | |
| Blastocarpous | Germination of seeds while within the pericarp, as in Rhizophora | |
| Blotched | The color disposed in broad, irregular blotches. | |
| Bole | The main stem or trunk of a tree. | |
| Bordered | One color is surrounded by an edging of another. (Compare with edged.) | |
| Bostryx | A determinate inflorescence in which the branches develop on one side only, appearing simple. | |
| Botany | The scientific study of plants. | |
| Botuliform | Sausage-shaped | g-botuliform.png |
| Brackish | Of or pertaining to water having a salt concentration of 0.5-30 parts per thousand. | |
| Bract | A modified, usually reduced leaf, often occurring at the base of a flower or inflorescence. | |
| Bracteal and Laminar | May be localized or found over entire structure | |
| Bracteole | Small leaf, usually on a pedicel. | |
| Bractlet | A secondary or smaller bract. | |
| Branch | A division or subdivision of a stem or other axis. | |
| Branchlet | An ultimate branch, i.e. one located at the end of a system of branches; a small branch. (Compare wi... | |
| Bristle | A slender, more or less straight and stiff, fine-pointed appendage; may be located at the tip of a l... | g-bristle.png |
| Bristly | Beset with bristles | g-bristly.png |
| Broad embryo | Basal, globular or lenticular embryo in copious endosperm. | g-broad-embyro.png |
| Broad-leaved | With leaves that are not needle-like or scale-like, but having relatively broad, flat surfaces, as i... | |
| Broadleaf herbaceous | Herbaceous with relatively broad leaves, thus differing from the long, narrow leaves of grasses (Poa... | |
| Brochidodromous | With a single primary vein, the secondary veins not terminating at the margin but joined together in... | |
| Bryophytes | The non-vascular plants including the mosses, liverworts, and hornworts; members of the division Bry... | |
| Bud | An immature shoot, either vegetative, floral or both, and often covered by protective scales. | |
| Bud Primordium | Meristematic tissue that gives rise to a lateral bud. | |
| Bulb | A short, vertical, usually underground stem with fleshy storage leaves attached, as in onions (Alliu... | g-bulb.png |
| Bulbel | A small bulb produced from the base of a larger bulb | |
| Bulbil | A small bulb or bulb-like body produced on above ground parts | g-bulbil.png |
| Bulblet | A small bulb, irrespective of origin; a small, bud-like vegetative propagule produced on the leaves ... | g-bulblet.png |
| Bullate | Puckered or blistered | |
| Bundle scar | A small scar within a leaf scar left by a vascular bundle that previously entered the stalk (petiole... | g-leaf-scar.png |
| Bur | A cypsela or other fruit enclosed in a whorl of dry bracts (involucre) covered with spines or prickl... | g-bur.png |
| Buttress | Roots with board-like or plank-like growth on upper side, presumably a supporting structure | g-buttress.png |
| Caducous | Falling off very early, as stipules that drop soon after the leaf develops. (Compare with persistent... | |
| Calcarate | Spurred | g-calcarate.png |
| Calceolate | Slipper-shaped, as in the corolla of Cypripedium | g-calceolate.png |
| Callosity | A thickened, raised area, which is usually hard; a callus | |
| Calybium | A hard one-loculed dry fruit derived from an inferior ovary, as in Quercus | g-calybium.png |
| Calycle | A whorl of bracts below but resembling a true calyx. | |
| Calyx | The collective term for all of the sepals of a flower; the outer perianth whorl. (Compare with corol... | g-gynoecium.png |
| Cambium | A layer of living cells in a woody plant, such as a tree, between the bark and the wood of the stem.... | |
| Campanulate | Bell-shaped; with flaring tube about as broad as long and a flaring limb | g-campanulate.png |
| Campylodromous | With several primary veins or their branches diverging at or close to a single point and running in ... | |
| Campylotropous | With body bent or curved on one side so that micropyle is near medially attached funiculus | g-campylotropous.png |
| Canaliculate | Longitudinally grooved, usually in relation to petioles or midribs | |
| Cancellate | Latticed | |
| Canescent | Gray or white in color due to a covering of short, fine, gray or white hairs. | g-canescent.png |
| Canopy | The upper layer of forest, formed by interlacing branches and leaves. | |
| Cantharophily | Pollinated by beetles | |
| Capillate | Hair-shapedCapitate. Head-like Capitulum or Head. A determinate or indeterminate crowded group o... | |
| Capitate | Head-like. | g-capitate.png |
| Capitulum | A determinate or indeterminate crowded group of sessile or subsessile flowers on a compound receptac... | |
| Capsule | A dry fruit that opens (dehisces) in any of various ways at maturity to release few to many seeds. | g-capsule.png |
| Carina | Keel. Carinal Canal - A canal beneath a stem ridge associated with a vascular bundle | g-carina.png |
| Carinal Canal | A canal beneath a stem ridge associated with a vascular bundle. | |
| Carinate | Keeled | g-carinate.png |
| Carnivorous | Capturing animals (usually insects), digesting their tissues and assimilating the digested substance... | |
| Carnivorous plants | Those that are able to digest and absorb nutrient elements from the bodies of animals, mainly insect... | |
| Carnose | Fleshy | |
| Carpel | The basic ovule-bearing unit of flowers, thought to be evolutionarily derived from an infolded leaf-... | g-carpel.png |
| Carpellate | Plant with pistillate flowers only | |
| Carpophore | Floral axis extension between adjacent carpels, as in the Apiaceae | |
| Carpopodium | Short, thick, pistillate stalk | |
| Carpotaxis | Arrangement of fruits, reproductive in function | |
| term | definition | image |