Trees or shrubs evergreen, dioecious or rarely monoecious. Leaves decussate, subopposite, or spirally arranged; blade scalelike, subulate, or linear to elliptic, stomatal lines abaxial or present on all surfaces. Pollen cones terminal, solitary or clustered in leaf axils, or borne in spikelike complexes; individual cones pedunculate or sessile; microsporophylls numerous, spirally arranged, with distinct adaxial and abaxial surfaces; microsporangia 2; pollen 2(or 3)-saccate in Chinese species, (rarely nonsaccate). Seed-bearing structures terminal or axillary, solitary, occasionally spikelike, comprising few to several spirally arranged bracts; all or only apical bracts fertile, smooth or warty; basal bracts sometimes fused and succulent (together with peduncle) to form a "receptacle," or obsolete; ovule (inverted) or inclined in Chinese species. Seed drupelike or nutlike, wholly or (in Dacrydium) partly enveloped in a sometimes colored and succulent epimatium derived from fertile ovulate scale. Cotyledons 2.
Plants dioecious or monoecious; male flowers in terminal or axillary strobili, the stamens usually many, the anthers 2-celled; female flower solitary or paired, axillary or terminal, or in strobili with megasporophylls 1-ovuled and bracteate; seed solitary, or paired; cotyledons 2
Trees, or shrubby in some species; leaves persistent, alternate or opposite, or absent and represented by phylloclades, very variable from acicular to broadly lanceolate
Ovules erect or inverted, with the sterile base of the seed scale complex (epimatium) usually ± folded over the ovule and the base of the bracts and cone axis sometimes swelling to form a fleshy receptacle
Trees and shrubs with linear to lanceolate or scale-leaves, usually dioecious, the males with small cones or spikes, the females with the cones small or reduced to 1 or 2 fertile scales
Staminate strobili terminal or axillary, forming single or fascicled usually bracteate catkin-like cones; fertile scales subpeltate, bearing 2 pollen-sacs towards the base of the blade, pollen grains winged
Leaves linear, lanceolate, narrowly ovate or more rarely scale-like, spirally arranged and sometimes disposed in one plane or apparently opposite
Ovule solitary, erect or inverted, soon becoming enclosed by a secondary integument variously developed from part of the strobilus
Female strobilus small with usually only 1 or 2 fertile scales
Evergreen trees or shrubs, usually dioecious (always in our area)
Plantes ligneuses , généralement dioïques, ramifiées, à canaux résinifères; feuilles spiralées, simples écailleuses ou linéaires à lancéolées.'Strobiles'petits et parfois réduits, à sporophylles généralement spiralés et nus.'Écailles staminales'à 2 sacs polliniques sur la face inférieure; grains de pollen ailés et à vésicules latérales.'Écailles ovulifères'à 1 ovule généralement exsert, unitégumenté et entouré ou non d'un épimatium (faux arille).'Graines à testa crustacé ou lignifié, entouré ou non d'un épimatium coriace ou charnu.\n\t\t\tSept genres et 100 espèces sur les montagnes des régions tropicales et dans les régions subtropicales australes.
