Accessory fruit

An accessory fruit is a fruit in which some of the flesh is derived not from the floral ovary but from some adjacent tissue exterior to the carpel.[1]

A selection of accessory fruits (from left to right: pear, fig, and strawberry)

Terminology

Alternative terms for accessory fruit are false fruit, spurious fruit, pseudofruit, or pseudocarp. These are older terms for accessory fruit that have been criticized as "inapt",[1] and are not used by some botanists today.

Examples

The following are examples of accessory fruits listed by the plant organ from which the accessory tissue is derived:[2]

Fruit with fleshy seeds, such as pomegranate or mamoncillo, are not considered to be accessory fruits.

See also

References

  1. Esau, K. 1977. Anatomy of seed plants. John Wiley and Sons, New York.
  2. Merriam Webster Collegiate Dictionary entries for syconium, accessory fruit, core, and strawberry, Merriam-Webster, Inc., 2006


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