Pussy Willow (Salix discolor)
- Family: Willow (Salicaceae)
- Flowering: April-May.
- Field Marks: The distinguishing features of the pussy willow are the broadly elliptic leaves that are usually rounded at the base and white but smooth on the lower surface.
- Habitat: Marshes, bottomland woods.
- Habit: Shrub or small tree up to 20 feet tall.
- Stems: Brown, hairy when young, becoming smooth.
- Leaves: Alternate, simple, broadly elliptic, pointed at the tip, tapering or rounded at the base, finely toothed, smooth, white on the lower surface, up to 1 1/2 inches long.
- Flowers: Many flowers crowded into dense, cylindrical spikes up to 3 inches long; the male and female flowers borne in different spikes; each flower tiny, subtended by a bract.
- Sepals: 0.
- Petals: 0.
- Stamens: 2.
- Pistils: Ovary 1.
- Fruits: Capsules long-tapering, gray-hairy, up to 1/2 inch long.
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