Obviously you have been doing too much pontificating and have not paying
attention, Melvin.
Are you aspiring to be Rinkytink's lap dog?

I gave a much better reference than the one you cite with out-dated
second-hand vague definitions. It is a almost a crime that some references
books have such lousy poorly conceived definitions. It really doesn't matter
that someone like you is under the mistaken impression that what they say is
gospel.

Here is a more thoughtful and thoroughly researched reference on the
subject:

Spjut, R.W. (1994) A SYSTEMATIC TREATMENT OF FRUIT TYPES. Memoires of the
N. Y. Bot. Gard. vol. 70.


mel turner wrote in message
...
In article ,
[Cereoid-UR12-] wrote...

You pretty much answered you own question as to why a banana is actually
a
pepo. The banana-like fruit of some Yucca would be considered a pepo
also.

And a "pepo" is considered to be one particular type of "berry".

Why not try looking in botanical dictionaries for the definitions?

I've done that. Have you? The botanical dictionaries, etc. I've
checked all seem to agree with my usage, and not with yours.

Can you find a botanical dictionary or other botanical text that
actually agrees with your definitions of "berry" and "drupe" below
[the "presence or absence of a stone endocarp has nothing to do
with it" part]?

I know it
seems a radical thing to suggest but books in libraries are still far
more
reliable as sources of info than the Internet.

Some of those cited links were for things such as the _Flora of
North America_, which is of course is also in book form. But sure,
books are great. Can you cite any books that agree with you on this
definitional question? See below for some you can skip, since
they don't.

You don't want to be like
Rinkytink and just make it all up off the top of your head, do you?

If a fleshy fruit has several seeds with a stone endocarp, they would
still
be called berries not drupes.

By laymen, perhaps, not by botanists who know of the more strict
technical definitions given in those botanical dictionaries.

1 seed = drupe, several seeds = berry. That's
all there is to it. The presence or absence of a stone endocarp has
nothing
to do with it.

Not according to the botanical dictionaries and glossaries in real
botany books. It's the seed number that really seems to have little
or nothing to do with it.

A fleshy or pulpy fruit with stony endocarp around the seed or seeds
= a drupe, a fleshy fruit without any stony endocarp = a berry. That's
about all there is to it.

Berries can have a single seed, and drupes can have several seeds
[commonly enclosed in several separate stones as in Ilex or Aralia].

For example, a famous, classic ref:

Fernald, M. L. 1950. Gray's Manual of Botany. Eighth ed. American Book
Co., NY.

From the glossary:

"Drupe: A fleshy or pulpy fruit with the inner portion of the pericarp
(1-locular and 1-seeded, or sometimes several-locular) hard or stony."

From its description of the genus _Ilex_:

"The berry-like drupe containing 4-9 nutlets."

From the description of _Ilex vomitoria_:

"drupes 5-8 mm in diameter; nutlets grooved on back."

From the description of the Araliaceae

"the fruit a few-several-locular drupe."

A couple of newer texts that happen to be at hand:

Hickey, M. and C. King. 2000. The Cambridge Illustrated Glossary of
Botanical Terms. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

"drupe A fleshy fruit with one or more seeds, each enclosed within a
stony endocarp, as in species of the genus Prunus (Rosaceae).

"berry A fleshy indehiscent fruit with the seed or seeds immersed in
pulp."

"pepo A unilocular many seeded hard-walled berry that forms the fruit
of _Cucurbita pepo_ (Marrow), _Cucumis melo_ (Melon) and some other
members of the Cucurbitaceae."

and

Allaby, M. [ed.] 1998. A Dictionary of Plant Sciences. 2nd ed. Oxford
University Press, Oxford.

"drupe A fleshy fruit such as a plum containing one or a few seeds,
each enclosed in a stony layer that is part of the fruit wall"

This dictionary's "berry" definition stresses "no hard parts other
than the seeds" [i.e., no stony endocarps], and lists 1-seeded dates
among its examples of "berries".

cheers