Plumular leaves
cataphyll, Niederblatt. Along any shoot, the cataphyll is a
leaf below the foliage leaves. It is more or less reduced to
its sheathing base (hypophyll) and thus appears scale-like,
often poor in chlorophyll or lacking it (e.g. bud scales).
When cataphylls occur in seedlings, they are the first
leaves after the cotyledon (Fig. 1).
Synonym: scale leaf.
eophyll (Tomlinson, 1960), Prima¨rblatt. In seedlings,
eophylls are the first plumular leaves with noteworthy
photosythetic activity, but are distinctly simpler in shape
and smaller in size than the foliage leaves of the adult
shoot (metaphylls) (Fig. 1). When the adult plant bears