Samara

Small, winged, one-seeded fruit, usually produced in clusters on trees. E.g. Maple (Acer): a double samara, ash (Fraxinus), elm (Ulmus) and tree of heaven (Ailanthus). Samaras resemble the winged seeds of a pine, but they are truly one-seeded fruits with a pericarp layer surrounding the seed. The leguminous tipu tree (Tipuana tipu) has a winged fruit that certainly resembles a samara even though it belongs to the legume family (Leguminosae or Fabaceae). Like auto-rotation of helicopters, the samaras spin as they sail through the air, an effective method of dispersal. Richard Spjut (1994) classifies some of the larger winged fruits of Shorea (Diptocarpaceae) and Gyrocarpus (Hernandiaceae) as a "pseudosamara."