Atriplex argentea |
Atriplex holocarpa |
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maidenhair spleenwort, silver orach, silver orache, silver saltbush, silverscale, silverscale orache, silverscale saltbush, silvery orache |
pop saltbush |
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Habit | Herbs, simple or freely branched, 0.5–6 dm; branches rather stout, angled, scurfy when young. | Herbs, annual or short-lived perennial, 1.5–3 dm, with a hard subligneous base. | ||||||||||||||||
Stems | branching, diffuse or procumbent, softly scurfy-tomentose. |
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Leaves | often opposite proximally, petiolate or distal bracteate ones subsessile, blade lance-ovate, lanceolate, deltoid, or cordate, 5–75 × 4–50(–75) mm, base subhastate or obtuse to acute, margin entire or essentially so, sometimes closely repand-dentate, apex obtuse to acute or rounded, scurfy (glabrous). |
alternate; petiole to 1/2 as long as blade; blade obovate or rhombic to deltoid, 10–30 mm, base obtuse, margin sinuate to serrate, apex irregularly toothed, acute. |
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Flowers | in axillary glomerules and terminal, interrupted spikes. |
in axillary glomerules, staminate in distal axils surrounded by pistillate flowers, these only and usually few together in most axils, very small and globular at anthesis. |
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Staminate flowers | borne in distal axils, or in short dense spikes or panicles, or intermixed with pistillate, with 4–5-parted calyx. |
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Seeds | brown, 1.5–2 mm wide; radicle superior or lateral. |
broadly elliptic; radical lateral, erect. |
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Fruiting | bracteoles sessile, subsessile, or stipitate (stipe 0.5–5 mm), cuneate-orbicular, (2.5–)4–11.2 × 2–8.8(–14) mm, margin foliaceous below apex, subentire or dentate to laciniate, face smooth, tuberculate, or crested, processes sometimes again toothed, teeth then aligned with axis of process. |
bracteoles sessile, obovoid-globular, fused, scarcely compressed, 8–12 mm, of loosely fibrous and spongy consistency, with thin membranous epidermis and thin, inner membrane, opening at summit closed by 2 erect, appressed, entire or 3-toothed valves, apex shortly apiculate, not flattened at top. |
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2n | = 18, 36, 54. |
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Atriplex argentea |
Atriplex holocarpa |
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Phenology | Flowering summer. | |||||||||||||||||
Habitat | Cultivated or weedy | |||||||||||||||||
Distribution |
AZ; CA; CO; ID; KS; MT; ND; NE; NM; NV; OK; OR; SD; TX; UT; WA; WY; AB; BC; MB; SK; Mexico
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TX; WY; Australia [Introduced in North America] |
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Discussion | Varieties 5 (5 in the flora). Herbarium materials have tended to represent a catchall for annual specimens not readily assignable to other taxa. Indeed, the distinguishing features of the Atriplex argentea complex are shared singly and often in combination with other taxa. Only by use of combinations of features can this taxon be defined. Those features, with much variation, center around the broad, typically ovate to deltoid leaf blades (often definitely 3-veined) and more-or-less compressed, sessile to subsessile (or short stipitate), fruiting bracteoles on which the marginal processes, or teeth, are mainly aligned with the plane compression, and with the faces quite smooth to variously appendaged. Still some specimens are apparently intermediate with other species, especially with the closely allied A. saccaria, with which it is at least partially sympatric. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
I have seen no specimens of this species and therefore it is not mapped. H. M. Hall and F. E. Clements (1923) in discussion of the related Atriplex lindleyi (as A. halimoides) noted that it has “been grown in American gardens with the thought of using them as forage plants, but…has [not] been found suitable for general planting. P. G. Wilson (1984) indicated that the species is relatively widespread in Australia, mainly in southern parts, where it grows “often on flood-plains or sandy flats.” (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 4. | FNA vol. 4, p. 342. | ||||||||||||||||
Parent taxa | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Obione > sect. Obione > subsect. Argenteae | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Atriplex > sect. Spongiocarpus | ||||||||||||||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||||||||||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||||||||||||||
Synonyms | Obione argentea | |||||||||||||||||
Name authority | Nuttall: Gen. N. Amer. Pl. 1: 198. (1818) | F. Mueller: Rep. Pl. Babbage’s Exped., 19. (1859) | ||||||||||||||||
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