Atriplex obovata |
Atriplex torreyi |
|||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
broadscale, mound saltbush, New Mexico saltbush, silver saltbush |
Torrey saltbush, Torrey's quailbush, Torrey's saltbush |
|||||
Habit | Subshrubs, dioecious, clump forming, mainly 2–8 dm and as wide, woody at base. | Shrubs, dioecious, forming broad clumps, mostly (8–)1.2–20(–30) dm; branchlets striately and often sharply angled, glabrous or sparingly puberulent, often becoming bluntly spiny. | ||||
Stems | stiffly erect; branchlets terete. |
|||||
Leaves | tardily deciduous, alternate or proximal-most subopposite, shortly petiolate; blade gray green, oblong-ovate to elliptic or orbiculate, 8–30(–35) × 6–20 mm, margin entire or rarely dentate, apex rounded to retuse or obtuse. |
persistent, alternate; petiole 1–4 mm; blade grayish or greenish, ovate to deltate, rhombic, oval, or lanceolate, typically subhastate, (5–)12–32 × 4–16(–20) mm, base truncate to obtuse, margin entire (rarely toothed), apex obtuse and apiculate. |
||||
Staminate flowers | yellow, in clusters 2–3 mm wide, borne in panicles 6–30 cm. |
yellow, in clusters 1 mm wide, borne in panicles mainly 10–30 cm. |
||||
Pistillate flowers | in small, very numerous glomerules in axils of elongated, terminal leafy-bracteate spikes or finally paniculate. |
in once-branched panicles. |
||||
Seeds | brown, 2.4–2.8 mm. |
brown, 1–1.9 mm wide. |
||||
Fruiting | bracteoles sessile or substipitate, 4–5 × 5–9 mm, base broadly cuneate, margin sharply toothed, apical tooth subtended by 2–6 equal or smaller teeth, faces smooth or rarely tuberculate. |
bracteoles sessile, orbiculate, greatly compressed, 1.3–4 mm, about as wide, margin crenate, apex rounded. |
||||
Atriplex obovata |
Atriplex torreyi |
|||||
Phenology | Flowering summer–fall. | |||||
Habitat | Fine-textured substrates, with salt desert shrub and lower pinyon-juniper communities | |||||
Elevation | 1500-2000 m (4900-6600 ft) | |||||
Distribution |
AZ; CO; NM; TX; UT; Mexico
|
AZ; CA; NV; UT
|
||||
Discussion | Varieties 2 (2 in the flora). (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
|||||
Key |
|
|||||
Source | FNA vol. 4, p. 371. | FNA vol. 4, p. 378. | ||||
Parent taxa | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Pterochiton | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Pterochiton | ||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||
Synonyms | A. greggii, A. jonesii, A. obovata var. tuberata | Obione torreyi, A. lentiformis subsp. torreyi, A. lentiformis var. torreyi | ||||
Name authority | Moquin-Tandon: Chenop. Monogr. Enum., 61. (1840) | (S. Watson) S. Watson: Proc. Amer. Acad. Arts 9: 119. (1874) | ||||
Web links |