I was wondering if all the broadleaf dicot sporophytes which have thick dicotyledons would be in the Fabaceae family, besides succulents (in other words, what I mean is the seedlings have thicker than usual seed leaves, and their true leaves are much thinner when they develop). I found this picture of an unidentified seedling, for example (possibly a pea plant): File:Seedling-477.jpg - Wikimedia Commons I think "fleshy" must be the descriptive term, instead of "thick", now. I remembered reading that succulent leaves were said to be fleshy, after finding a couple of descriptions of a legume and a soapberry plant for comparison. So it seems that other plant families have seedlings with fleshy seed leaves. Anyhow, I still wonder what seedlings anyone here has identified with fleshy seed leaves (besides succulents), or which would be most common, thanks. I think the ones I've seen look like Prunus avium seedlings, yet there doesn't seem to be a description of those having thick or fleshy cotyledons; well that's what they look like to me. I just had to guess the little true leaves might be in the Rosaceae family, and then look up the seedling based on that in order to find similar cotyledons. Gosh, I haven't found that using morphological terms is all that useful for identifying seedlings. Right, so, morphologically, I must be in the seedy underbelly of a seedling discussion here.
The image is identified as a bean in the metadata, Categories: Cotyledons (leaves) Phaseolus vulgaris (seedlings) Seedlings other than Fabaceae with fleshy cotyledons that come to mind are sunflowers and squash. It's fascinating how different plants used different methods to reproduce by seed. Some make countless tiny seeds and others make just a few or one large seed with energy stored to carry it for a while. Some can last for years, others screw themselves into the ground and sprout immediately.
Oh yeah, thanks. I hadn't noticed that info at the very bottom of those pages, sometimes it is immediately under the photographs, where I usually looked for it. Mostly I've seen maple seedlings (Japanese I think), it's like every leaf on the tree sprouted up in the ground around here. I'm not sure where the other seedlings came from, maybe one of the rosy looking shrubs or trees nearby.
