PLANTS: Aerial shrubs parasitic on Pinaceae, 2-25 em high, glabrous, dioecious.
SHOOTS: variously colored, greenish-yellow to orange, reddish, and black, quadrangular, at least when young.
LEAVES: reduced to minute scales.
INFLORESCENCE: of axillary spikes.
FLOWERS: decussate (sometimes whorled), short pedicellate; staminate flowers with a central nectary, the perianth segments (2-)3-4(-5), each segment bearing a sessile, circular, uniloculate anther; pistillate flowers with a single style and rounded stigma, the perianth segments 2, persistent.
FRUIT: mostly 3-5 mm long, bicolored, dehiscing explosively (to 15 m); pedicels curved at maturity.
NOTES: 33 spp. in U.S. and Mex., 8 in the Old World. (Greek: Arceuthos = juniper + bios-living). Hawksworth, F.G., & D., Wiens. 1972. Biology and Classification of Dwarf Mistletoes (Arceuthobium). U.S.D.A. Agricultural Handbook 401.
REFERENCES: Hawksworth, Frank G. 1994. Viscaceae. J. Ariz. - Nev. Acad. Sci. Volume 27(2), 241-245.
Dioecious; fls solitary or few in the axils of scale-like, connate, decussate lvs; staminate perianth 2-5-lobed; anther sessile at the middle of each lobe, opening transversely; pistillate perianth 2-lobed; berry on a short, recurved pedicel. 28, mainly of N. Amer.
Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.
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