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Beech Family
The family Fagaceae, or beech family, is characterized by alternate leaves with pinnate venation, flowers in the form of catkins, and fruit in the form of nuts, one to seven in a scale or spiny husk that may or may not enclose the nut. The best-known group of this family is the oaks, genus Quercus, the fruit of which is called an acorn. The husk of the acorn in most oaks only forms a cup in which the nut sits.
Genera:
- Castanea - chestnuts; eight species, north temperate east Asia, southwest Asia, southeast Europe, eastern North America
- Castanopsis - about 125-130 species, southeast Asia
- Chrysolepis - golden chinkapin; two species, western USA
- Colombobalanus - one species C. excelsa, northern South America, often included in Trigonobalanus
- Fagus - beeches; 10 species, north temperate east Asia, southwest Asia, Europe, eastern North America
- Formanodendron - one species F. doichangensis, southeast Asia, often included in Trigonobalanus
- Lithocarpus - tanoaks or tanbark oaks; about 330-340 species, all but one in warm temperate to tropical Asia, the one (L. densiflorus) in California and southwest Oregon
- Nothofagus - southern beeches; about 35 species, southern South America, New Zealand, southeast Australia, New Caledonia, New Guinea
- Quercus - oaks; about 500 species, widespread Northern Hemisphere, crossing the equator in Indonesia
- Trigonobalanus - one species T. verticillata, tropical southeast Asia (three species if Colombobalanus and Formanodendron included)
The genus Nothofagus is sometimes placed in a separate family, Nothofagaceae.
External link
Kew checklist - Fagales
Betulaceae - Corylaceae - Fagaceae - Ticodendraceae - Casuarinaceae - Juglandaceae - Rhoipteleaceae - Myricaceae
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