Botanical Family · Ericales

Ericaceae

Heather Family

4 speciesOrder Ericales4+ well-known plants

The Ericaceae family (Heather Family) is a botanical family placed in the order Ericales. In the SASYA catalogue it spans 4 species across 3 genera. Members range from shrubs to trees. Well-represented genera include Rhododendron, Gaultheria and Vaccinium. Familiar examples include Indian winter Green, Rhododendron arboreum subsp. nilagiricum and Nilgiri Rhododendron.

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Representative specimen · Ericaceae

Key pattern

Small, often leathery, evergreen leaves on shrubs adapted to acidic, nutrient-poor soils; urn- or bell-shaped flowers fuse their petals into a tube and release pollen through small pores at the anther tip rather than a simple slit.

Roots throughout the family form a specialised partnership with mycorrhizal fungi that lets them extract scarce nutrients from acidic soils most other plants cannot use.

Identify the species

Which Ericaceae species is this?

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Family identification method

To check whether a plant belongs to Ericaceae, compare the leaf arrangement, leaf type, flower symmetry, fruit type, and one distinctive marker together. A single feature can mislead; the family pattern is the combination.

Learn the full family-identification method