Atriplex argentea |
Atriplex suckleyi |
|||||||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
maidenhair spleenwort, silver orach, silver orache, silver saltbush, silverscale, silverscale orache, silverscale saltbush, silvery orache |
Suckley's orach |
|||||||||||||||||
Habit | Herbs, simple or freely branched, 0.5–6 dm; branches rather stout, angled, scurfy when young. | Herbs, spreading, branching from base, (0.3–)0.5–3(–4) dm and as broad. | ||||||||||||||||
Stems | terete, often tinged with red, sparsely mealy or glabrous. |
|||||||||||||||||
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). |
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. |
||||||||||||||||
Flowers | in axillary glomerules and terminal, interrupted spikes. |
|||||||||||||||||
Staminate flowers | borne in distal axils, or in short dense spikes or panicles, or intermixed with pistillate, with 4–5-parted calyx. |
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. |
||||||||||||||||
Pistillate flowers | solitary or few in leaf axils, calyx within bracteoles of 3 or 4, entire or lobed, distinct, obtuse, hyaline sepals. |
|||||||||||||||||
Seeds | brown, 1.5–2 mm wide; radicle superior or lateral. |
brown, 1.5 × 1.2 mm. |
||||||||||||||||
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 small and difficult to find, sessile, ovate, 2 × 1.5 mm, membranous, united to apex, without appendages, scurfy, each pistil subtended by a perianth. |
||||||||||||||||
2n | = 18, 36, 54. |
|||||||||||||||||
Atriplex argentea |
Atriplex suckleyi |
|||||||||||||||||
Phenology | Flowering late summer–fall. | |||||||||||||||||
Habitat | Alkaline or saline, typically fine-textured substrates, often on shale or clay barrens, sometimes with other Atriplex spp., sagebrush, and grasses | |||||||||||||||||
Elevation | (400-)1200-2200 m ((1300-)3900-7200 ft) | |||||||||||||||||
Distribution |
AZ; CA; CO; ID; KS; MT; ND; NE; NM; NV; OK; OR; SD; TX; UT; WA; WY; AB; BC; MB; SK; Mexico
|
CO; MT; ND; SD; WY; AB; SK |
||||||||||||||||
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.) |
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.) |
||||||||||||||||
Key |
|
|||||||||||||||||
Source | FNA vol. 4. | FNA vol. 4, p. 345. | ||||||||||||||||
Parent taxa | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Obione > sect. Obione > subsect. Argenteae | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Obione > sect. Endolepis | ||||||||||||||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||||||||||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||||||||||||||
Synonyms | Obione argentea | Endolepis suckleyi, A. endolepis, A. ovata, Endolepis dioica, Endolepis ovata, Kochia dioica, Salsola dioica | ||||||||||||||||
Name authority | Nuttall: Gen. N. Amer. Pl. 1: 198. (1818) | (Torrey) Rydberg: Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 1: 134. (1900) | ||||||||||||||||
Web links |
|