Atriplex covillei
Atriplex patula
Coville's orach
common orache, halberd-leaf orache, spear orach, spear orache, spear oracle, spear saltbush, spear saltweed, spearscal e, spearscale orache
terete, sparsely scurfy when young.
mostly erect and branched, branches green, obtusely angled or striate, glabrate.
petiole to 1/2 as long as blade (becoming subsessile distally);
blade green or finally stramineous, (10–)20–50 × 6–30 mm, firm, base abruptly acute to narrowly cuneate, apex acute to attenuate, sparsely scurfy.
alternate except the proximalmost, petiolate;
blade green on both sides, rhombic-lanceolate to lanceolate, oblong, or narrowly lance-oblong or hastate-ovate, 25–120 × 3–40(–75) mm, entire or toothed, proximal ones broadly cuneate or sometimes hastate subbasally with obliquely antrorse basal lobes, distal cauline leaves lanceolate and entire.
compact or interrupted spiciform or paniculiform clusters.
in sessile glomerules in distal axils, often mixed with pistillate ones, staminate calyx deeply 5-cleft;
lobes obtuse, not appendaged.
mostly 5-merous.
with calyx of (1–)3(–5) hyaline sepals.
dark reddish brown, 1–1.5 mm.
dimorphic: brown, 2.5–3(–3.5) mm wide, or black, 1–2 mm wide;
radicle of brown seeds subbasal to median, antrorse.
bracteoles sessile or stipitate, 6–12 × 4–7 mm, margin mostly 3-lobed, with elongate terminal lobe triangular to lanceolate, 2 short rounded lobes at base or sides merely rounded at base, united to beyond middle.
bracteoles green becoming black, rhombic to rhombic-triangular, or ovate-rhombic, compressed, ± uniformly sized, 2–7(–20) mm, base mostly hastate, acute, margin united almost to middle, entire or sparingly toothed, surfaces tuberculate.
= 36.
Atriplex covillei
Atriplex patula
Endolepis covillei was treated within the synonymy of Atriplex phyllostegia (Torrey) S. Watson by H. M. Hall and F. E. Clements (1923).
H. C. Stutz et al. (1993) placed Atriplex covillei within Endolepis, based in large part on the presence of a perianth subtending the pistil within the fruiting bracteoles and on the lack of Kranz anatomy in the leaves. The pattern of venation is, nevertheless, very similar to that in species with Kranz anatomy. The presence of perianth scales in the pistillate flowers of A. covillei has been regarded as evidence of relationship with A. suckleyi. Despite placement of these taxa within Endolepis by Stutz et al. Atriplex covillei is possibly more closely allied to the morphologically similar and partially sympatric A. phyllostegia than it is to strongly dissimilar and the distantly disjunct A. suckleyi. Stutz and his associates placed great emphasis on the presence of reduced perianth segments subtending the pistil within the fruiting bracteoles of A. covillei. Calyces per se, otherwise known only in A. suckleyi and A. pleiantha, probably have arisen independently. Their presence does not necessarily indicate a close relationship. Stutz et al. pointed to other differences aside from the calyx of the pistillate flowers, and it is apparent that the two entities can stand as distinct species. To segregate A. covillei within a separate genus and to ally it with a species to which its relationships are obscure at best, stretches logic beyond reason.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Atriplex patula appears to have been a rather recent introduction in North America from Eurasia, not arriving perhaps until sometime in the early to mid-eighteenth century. It simulates depauperate specimens of A. dioica, A. glabriuscula, and other similar species when leaves are reduced to a near-linear profile. Such specimens are difficult if not impossible to assign to any of the species.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
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