What’s a Peduncle?

Fuji apples (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

Here’s a puzzle. Don’t google it.  Look at the photos to arrive at an answer.

In botany: What is a peduncle?

We encounter peduncles every day though we don’t use the word much anymore.  Since 1950 the word has fallen out of common use and because it looks like pedophile+uncle the urban dictionary lists a raunchy meaning. But that’s not what it is.

Peduncle comes from ped (Latin for foot) plus -uncle (an Old French diminutive ending) so it literally means tiny foot.

Each photo on this page has at least one visible peduncle.  Can you find it?

Black raspberries (photo by Kate St. John)
Elderberries at Jennings, 4 Aug 2018 (photo by Kate St. John)
Elderberries at Jennings, 4 Aug 2018 (photo by Kate St. John)
Fruit of the ginkgo tree (photo from Wikimedia Commons)

Here’s a clue.  The number of peduncles in each photo above is:

  • Apples = 1
  • Black raspberries = 5 (three are hidden)
  • Elderberries = too many to count
  • Ginkgos = 9

Final clue: The photo below shows no fruit, but it has peduncles.

Fruit stems on a Sassafras Tree (photo by Dianne Machesney)

Still stumped?  Click here for the answer.

(photos from Kate St. John, Dianne Machesney and Wikimedia Commons. Click on the Wikimedia captions to see the originals.)

5 thoughts on “What’s a Peduncle?

  1. I looked it up on Wikipedia. If I understand it correctly, a flower that is not part of an inflorescence is called a solitary flower and its stalk is referred to as a peduncle.

    But for an inflorescence (multiple flowers attached to a single point or stem), the pedicel is the stem attached to the fruit (or flower before it), and that point of attachment or stem is called the peduncle.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedicel_(botany)

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inflorescence

    Or, Wikipedia could be wrong, which wouldn’t be surprising.

    1. Mary Ann, thanks for the explanation… the nuances are more difficult than I’d like them to be!

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