Atriplex parishii |
Atriplex linearis |
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Parish's brittlescale, Parish's saltbush, Parrish's brittlescale |
slenderleaf saltbush, thinleaf fourwing saltbush |
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Habit | Herbs, erect or spreading to prostrate, 0.5–3 dm; branches almost horizontal to ascending, fragile, white scurfy or villous (in var. parishii). | Shrubs dioecious, erect, mainly 10–25 dm; branchlets slender, terete. | ||||||||||||||||
Leaves | numerous, all or nearly all opposite or almost all alternate, distal ones imbricate or widely separated, tending to recurve; blade lanceolate to ovate, (2–)4–10 × 3–8 mm, rigid, base mostly rounded to cordate, margin entire, gray to white, densely scurfy (or hairy). |
sessile; blade narrowly linear-elliptic, 10–50 × 2–3 mm, firm, revolute, often acute apically. |
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Staminate flowers | mostly in distal axils pistillate in proximal axils, or mostly in terminal spike (var. persistens), or partly so (var. subtilis). |
in glomerules borne in slender interrupted mostly paniculate spikes. |
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Pistillate flowers | paniculate or in few-flowered axillary glomerules. |
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Seeds | dark brown or almost black, 0.8–1.5 mm. |
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Fruiting | bracteoles sessile, ovate or rhombic, slightly compressed to thickened, 2–3.5(–4) mm and about as broad or sometimes broader, often subhastately lobed, united 1/2 of length, entire or with few teeth on each side, tuberculate on 1 or both faces. |
bracteoles sessile or subsessile, lanceolate to ovate, 4–6 mm, about as wide, each bract with a pair of thin wings 3 mm broad or less, irregularly dentate or laciniate, free tips of bracts much exceeding the wings. |
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2n | = 18. |
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Atriplex parishii |
Atriplex linearis |
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Phenology | Flowering spring–fall. | |||||||||||||||||
Habitat | Saline deserts, with shadscale, Canotia, Yucca, Opuntia, Rhus, and Eriogonum | |||||||||||||||||
Elevation | 0-800 m (0-2600 ft) | |||||||||||||||||
Distribution |
CA
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AZ; CA; nw Mexico (Baja California, Sonora)
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Discussion | Varieties 5 (5 in the flora). The Atriplex parishii complex consists of a series of microphyllous, low clump-forming annuals apparently disjunct from each other in the Central Valley of California and in near coastal southern California. Often they occupy vernal pools that dry as the season progresses; the substrates in all cases evidently are saline or alkaline, or both. For the most part, the bracteate distal leaves are cordate to rounded at the base, and spreading to spreading-ascending, and the fruiting bracteoles are mainly less than 3.5 mm in length. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Specimens of Atriplex canescens var. macilenta resemble A. linearis. The taxa have been placed together by some previous workers. Nevertheless, the stems of A. linearis are consistently more slender, the leaves proportionally narrower, and the bracts, though smaller, more closely simulate those of A. canescens. Its diploid nature signals a different evolutionary pathway than that for most of A. canescens, considered broadly. Narrow leaves occur within A. canescens, in the broad sense, sometimes with geographic correlation, sometimes not. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 4, p. 356. | FNA vol. 4, p. 381. | ||||||||||||||||
Parent taxa | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Obione > sect. Obione > subsect. Pusillae | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Pterochiton | ||||||||||||||||
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Subordinate taxa | ||||||||||||||||||
Synonyms | Obione parishii | A. canescens subsp. linearis, A. canescens var. linearis | ||||||||||||||||
Name authority | S. Watson: Proc. Amer. Acad. Arts 17: 377. (1882) | S. Watson: Proc. Amer. Acad. Arts 24: 72. (1889) | ||||||||||||||||
Web links |