Atriplex glabriuscula |
Atriplex lindleyi |
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bract orache, glabrous orach, scotland orache |
Lindley's saltbush |
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Habit | Herbs, monoecious, prostrate or sprawling, or sometimes erect, branched, (1–)2–10 dm; branches opposite or subopposite. | Herbs, erect or suffrutescent perennial, 1.5–4 dm, woody at base. | ||||||||
Stems | green and striped, often blue-green when fresh, weakly ridged, sparsely scurfy to glabrous. |
terete, finely white-mealy when young. |
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Leaves | petiole 0.2–2.5(–3.5) cm; blade all entire or some or all triangular or lance-hastate with lobes spreading to antrorse, 5–100 × 3–80 mm, base abruptly to narrowly cuneate, entire or irregularly toothed. |
alternate, petiolate proximally, becoming sessile distally, crowded; blade oblanceolate or proximal rhombic, 10–20(–30) × 3–15 mm, base cuneate or attenuate, margin entire to repand-denticulate, apex acute to obtuse, scurfy. |
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Flowers | in loose glomerules, arranged in foliose, interrupted spikes or axillary, terminating stems and branches. |
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Staminate flowers | in axillary glomerules, in short axillary spikes or terminal spikes. |
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Pistillate flowers | axillary, solitary or few and clustered below staminate. |
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Seeds | dimorphic: brown, 2.5–4 mm wide (often the only ones present), or black, (1.2–)1.5–2.9(–3) mm wide; radicle median, ± antrorse, of brown seed basal and spreading. |
dimorphic: dark reddish brown, 1.5 mm wide, or black, slightly smaller; radicle basal, horizontal. |
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Bracteoles | green, becoming black or reddish to yellow brown, sessile or some short stipitate, venation obscure, ovate-triangular to rhombic-triangular, 5–13 mm, margin united almost to middle, with few irregular teeth or entire, apex abruptly acuminate, faces irregularly muricate, tuberculate, or smooth, inflated, spongy inner layer strongly developed at bracteole base. |
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Fruiting | bracteoles sessile, bordered by narrow horizontal wing or acutely angled, broadly turbinate or hemispheric, united except at minute apical tips, 6–12 mm, spongy and inflated at maturity, flattened at summit. |
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2n | = 18, 36. |
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Atriplex glabriuscula |
Atriplex lindleyi |
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Habitat | Sparingly escaped from cultivation | |||||||||
Distribution |
CT; MA; ME; NH; PA; AB; MB; NB; NS; PE; QC; Europe
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CA; Australia [Introduced in North America] |
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Discussion | Varieties 3 (3 in the flora). Members of the Atriplex glabriuscula complex occupy saline or brackish marshes and saline coastal strands mainly in the eastern maritime provinces of Canada, with extensions in similar habitats into the northeastern United States. They are seldom, if ever, ruderal weeds and appear to be indigenous or perhaps early introduced in some part from similar European habitats. The constituent taxa have been regarded at specific level (P. M. Taschereau 1972; I. J. Bassett et al. 1983). They are, however, alike in all major morphologic features, and are apparently closely allied. For those who wish to treat them at specific level, the names are supplied in the synonymy. (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. Atriplex > sect. Teutliopsis | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Atriplex > sect. Spongiocarpus | ||||||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||||||
Synonyms | A. halimoides | |||||||||
Name authority | Edmondston: Fl. Shetland, 39. (1845) | Moquin-Tandon: in A. P. de Candolle and A. L. P. P. de Candolle, Prodr. 13(2): 100. (1849) | ||||||||
Web links |