Dicots

Dicots, short for dicotyledons, are a traditional name for a diverse group of flowering plants that typically produce two seed leaves, or cotyledons, when they germinate. Historically they formed one of the two major divisions of flowering plants, alongside monocots. In modern plant systematics, however, dicots are not recognized as a formal clade; most species once labeled dicots belong to the clade eudicots, while other lineages such as magnoliids and basal angiosperms lie outside that group. As a result, the term is used mainly in descriptive or educational contexts rather than as a strict phylogenetic category.

Common features attributed to dicots include: two cotyledons in the seed; leaves with reticulate (net-like) venation; vascular bundles arranged in a ring in the stem; pollen with multiple apertures (tricolpate) in many lineages; and floral parts typically in multiples of four or five. Many dicots show secondary growth and form trees, shrubs, or herbaceous plants.

Dicots comprise a large portion of flowering plant diversity and include many familiar trees and ornamental plants as well as numerous crops, such as beans, peas, soybeans, sunflowers, and daisies. They occupy a wide range of habitats and ecological roles, from forests to grasslands and gardens.