Oriental Staff Vine (TVA, White's Creek Small Wild Area, Plants)

Oriental Staff Vine

Celastrus orbiculatus

Summary ³

Celastrus orbiculatus is a woody vine of the Celastraceae family. It is commonly called Oriental bittersweet. Other common names include Chinese bittersweet,Asian bittersweet,Round-leaved bittersweet, and Asiatic bittersweet. Celastrus orbiculatus was introduced into North America in 1879, and is considered to be an invasive species in eastern North America. It closely resembles the native North American species, Celastrus scandens, with which it will readily hybridize.

Biology and spread ⁴

Oriental bittersweet reproduces prolifically by seed, which is readily dispersed to new areas by many species of birds including mockingbirds, blue jays and European starlings. The seeds germinate in late spring. It also expands vegetatively through root suckering.

Breeding system and pollination ⁵

More info for the terms: dioecious, monoecious, perfect, polygamodioecious

Oriental bittersweet uses both dioecious and perfect breeding systems [62]. This species is typically "functionally dioecious" because early abortion of either male or female organs makes most individual plants unisexual [10]. Plants occasionally develop both unisexual and perfect flowers, becoming polygamodioecious [42,129], and some plants are reportedly monoecious [58].

Hymenoptera, especially bees, pollinate Oriental bittersweet flowers. Wind pollination also occurs (fact sheet by [24], review by [170]).

Four Oriental bittersweet populations from Connecticut were studied for pollen viability. Mean pollen viability across populations was 67%, but viability was significantly different among populations (P<0.05), varying from 17.3% to 74.3%. Oriental bittersweet Ã— American bittersweet hybrids had low pollen viability [26].

Comments ⁶

This is one of the most widely distributed Celastrus species in China. The ripe fruit is used in Chinese traditional medicine, called "wattle flower" in NE and N China. The bark is used for fine fiber, and seed oiliness is 50%. It is also widely distributed in Asia and its leaf morphology is very variable.

Description ⁷

Deciduous twining shrubs; branchlets glabrous, gray- brown or brown, with sparse and inconspicuous lenticels; axillary buds small, ovate to elliptic, 1-3 mm. Petiole slender, 1-2 cm; leaf blade generally broadly ovate, suborbicular, or rectangular-elliptic, 5-13 × 3-9 cm, glabrous or abaxially sparsely pubescent on veins, base broadly cuneate to obtuse-orbicular, margin serrate, apex broadly rounded, muriculate, or shortly acuminate; secondary veins 3-5 pairs. Cymes axillary, sometimes terminal, 1-3 cm, 1-7-flowered; pedicels jointed below middle or nearly to base. Male flowers: sepals obtuse-triangular; petals obovate-elliptic to rectangular, 3-4 × 2-2.5 mm; disk shallowly cupuliform, lobe shallow, apex rounded-obtuse; stamens 2-3 mm. Female flowers: corolla relatively shorter than that of male flower; disk slightly thick, carnose; staminodes very short; ovary approximately globose; styles ca. 1.5 mm; stigma deeply 3-lobed, lobe apex shallowly 2-lobed. Capsule approximately globose, 8-13 mm wide, yellow, 3-valved. Seeds elliptic, slightly flat, 4-5 × 2.5-3 mm, reddish brown; aril orange-red. Fl. May-Jun, fr. Jul-Oct.

Sources and Credits

(c) Elizabeth Sellers, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://www.flickr.com/photos/76276920@N00/4651430506
(c) Sara Rall, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Sara Rall
Adapted by Jonathan (JC) Carpenter from a work by (c) Wikipedia, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celastrus_orbiculatus
(c) Unknown, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/22948558
Public Domain, http://eol.org/data_objects/24643882
(c) Missouri Botanical Garden, 4344 Shaw Boulevard, St. Louis, MO, 63110 USA, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/19803206
(c) Missouri Botanical Garden, 4344 Shaw Boulevard, St. Louis, MO, 63110 USA, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC-SA), http://eol.org/data_objects/4971205

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