Atriplex acanthocarpa
Atriplex suckleyi
armed saltbush, burscale, tubercled saltbush
Suckley's orach
terete, often tinged with red, sparsely mealy or glabrous.
persistent, proximal ones opposite, becoming alternate distally, short petiolate or subsessile;
blade oblong to oblong-lanceolate, ovate, obovate, or spatulate, 12–40(–50) × 5–25 mm, base commonly subhastate to cuneate, margin entire or sinuate-dentate to strongly undulate-crisped, apex acute.
numerous, alternate, sessile;
blade lanceolate to elliptic or less commonly ovate, 7–35 × (2–)4–10(–11) mm, thick and succulent, base acute, margin entire, apex acute or acuminate, glaucous, sparsely farinose when young.
in interrupted or crowded glomerules 2–4.5 mm thick, in sparsely leafy paniculate spikes to 5+ dm.
in small glomerules, these in distal axils or in short, dense or interrupted, mostly simple, terminal spikes, perianth cup-shaped, frequently pinkish, lobes each with fleshy crest.
few to solitary, in axillary clusters or in crowded or interrupted, often leafy, erect, branched spicate racemes or racemose panicles to 25+ cm.
solitary or few in leaf axils, calyx within bracteoles of 3 or 4, entire or lobed, distinct, obtuse, hyaline sepals.
brown, 1.5–2 mm.
brown, 1.5 × 1.2 mm.
bracteoles on slender or stout stipes (2–)4–20 mm (or sessile), body broadly elliptic to globose, 6–15 mm and wide, spongy, united to the linear apex, margin deeply laciniate, faces appendaged with flattened to hornlike tubercles to 8 mm.
bracteoles small and difficult to find, sessile, ovate, 2 × 1.5 mm, membranous, united to apex, without appendages, scurfy, each pistil subtended by a perianth.
Atriplex acanthocarpa
Atriplex suckleyi
Varieties 2 (2 in the flora).
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
At specific rank, the epithet suckleyi clearly has priority. Stutz et al. (1993) resurrected Endolepis Torrey and placed within it two completely disparate species, E. dioica and E. covillei Standley [Atriplex covillei (Standley) J. F. Macbride]. The interpretation of the genus by Stutz et al. stands on the presence of perianth segments subtending the ovary within the fruiting bracteoles, lack of Kranz leaf anatomy, and other more equivocal characteristics. The shared features hardly indicate near affinity, however. The two taxa are otherwise grossly dissimilar. Fundamentally, the genus Endolepis as resurrected by H. C. Stutz et al. stands on the basis of a single character: the presence of perianth segments. Kranz anatomy rises and falls, both within subg. Atriplex and subg. Obione. Thus, coincidence of the non-Kranz criterion is subject to interpretation. Perianth segments subtending the ovary within the enclosing bracteoles, per se, appear to be of independent origin. And, the peculiar nature of the staminate calyx in A. suckleyi (a major determining condition in establishment of the genus Endolepis by Torrey) is not present in A. covillei. Certainly the two species included within Endolepis appear to be as closely allied to other species of Atriplex as they are to each other.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
1. Leaf blade ovate to rhombic-ovate, elliptic, or spatulate, margin mainly sinuate-dentate; mature fruiting inflorescences ascending to erect; west Texas, s New Mexico, se Arizona | var. acanthocarpa |
1. Leaf blade, at least some, hastate-lanceolate, or strongly undulate-crisped; mature fruiting inflorescences mainly horizontally spreading; s Texas, Mexico | var. coahuilensis |
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