caudex

American  

[kaw-deks] / ˈkɔ dɛks /

noun

Botany.

plural

caudices, caudexes

1. the main stem of a tree, especially a palm or tree fern.

2. the woody or thickened persistent base of an herbaceous perennial.

---

caudex British  

/ ˈkɔːdɛks /

noun

1. the thickened persistent stem base of some herbaceous perennial plants

2. the woody stem of palms and tree ferns

---

caudex Scientific  

/ kô′dĕks′ /

1. The thickened, usually underground base of the stem of many perennial herbaceous plants, from which new leaves and flowering stems arise.

2. The trunk of a palm or tree fern.

---

Etymology

Origin of caudex

1820–30; < Latin: tree trunk; codex

Example Sentences

She loves caudiciform succulents — plants that have an above-soil round caudex — and designs squat planters that highlight the plant’s swollen stem.

From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 1, 2021

There are chocolate brown and speckled buff vessels for caudex, pagoda planters for Adenia glauca, checkerboard glazed pots for pussywillows, striped planters for Pilea peperomioides and philodendrons and donut-shaped vessels for hoyas and airplants.

From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 1, 2021

They come here, they said, for the caudex, begonias, cycads, caudiciforms and rare succulents and cactus that Bulaon and his girlfriend, Ernestine Segura, regularly stock.

From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 13, 2020

The word code comes from the Latin caudex, the wooden pith of a tree on which scribes carved their writing.

From "The Gene" by Siddhartha Mukherjee

The stem is short or entirely wanting, arising from a long and thick caudex.

From The Mushroom, Edible and Otherwise Its Habitat and its Time of Growth by Hard, Miron Elisha