Category: 1. Differences Between Monocots and Dicots

• Two seed leaves—cotyledon
• Flower components in fours or fives or multiples of fours or fives
• Leaf veins are branching and networked
• Vascular cambium present, usually cork cambium present
• Vascular bundles are arranged in a ring in the stem
• Three apertures in pollen grains

Dicots account for slightly under three-quarters of all flowering plants. Nearly all flowering trees and shrubs are dicots as well as many annual plants. Monocots include bulb producing plants, grasses, orchids, and palms. They are primarily herbaceous, meaning no secondary woody growth.

• One seed leaf—cotyledon
• Flower components in threes or multiples of three
• Leaf veins are parallel
• No vascular or cork cambiums
• Vascular bundles are scattered throughout the stem
• One aperture (thin spot) in pollen grains

Flowering plants grow in a wide variety of habitats and environments. They can go from germination of a seed to a mature plant producing new seeds in as little as a month or as long as 150 years. Plants that complete their life cycle in a single season are called annuals while biennials take two years, and perennials may take several to many years to go from germinated seed to producing new seeds. There are two major classes of flowering plants, monocots and dicots— which have been mentioned previously in the Leaves and Stems tutorials. In order to keep these two classes separate in our minds, let’s take a moment and outline some of the differences between them.

Differences Between Monocots and Dicots