Introduction

Morphology is the study of an organism's various external features. Applied to plants, it is also called external morphology, and it examines the shape, size and structure of a plant's parts - its roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits and seeds. This study matters well beyond simple description: morphological features are central to Taxonomy, help determine how productive a crop is likely to be, and - because morphological characters reflect the specific habitat a plant (living or fossil) grows in - they let scientists correlate how fossil plants were distributed across space and time. Morphological features also carry weight in working out phylogeny, the evolutionary relationships between plants. Plant Morphology as a subject is studied under two broad categories: Vegetative Morphology, covering the shoot system and root system, and Reproductive Morphology, covering the flower/inflorescence, fruit and seed. Vegetative morphology, specifically, deals with the shape, size and structure of a plant's roots, stems and leaves, and is studied through three key components - habit, habitat and lifespan.