Atriplex patula
Atriplex parryi
common orache, halberd-leaf orache, spear orach, spear orache, spear oracle, spear saltbush, spear saltweed, spearscal e, spearscale orache
Parry's saltbush
mostly erect and branched, branches green, obtusely angled or striate, glabrate.
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.
, short petiolate to sessile;
blade orbiculate-cordate, or ovate-deltate to elliptic, 7–16(–22) × 6–10(–16) mm, base truncate or tapering, entire or less commonly subhastate.
compact or interrupted spiciform or paniculiform clusters.
mostly 5-merous.
in glomerules on interrupted, leafy paniculate spikes.
in small glomerules borne in leafy, paniculate spikes.
dimorphic: brown, 2.5–3(–3.5) mm wide, or black, 1–2 mm wide;
radicle of brown seeds subbasal to median, antrorse.
brown, 1.3–1.9 mm.
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.
bracteoles sessile or nearly so, truncate-flabelliform, 3–4 × 3–5 mm, thick and rigid, spongy, united to beyond middle, margin entire, faces smooth.
= 36.
Atriplex patula
Atriplex parryi
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.)
Atriplex parryi occurs with greasewood, saltbush, saltgrass, and Nitrophila. The cordate-clasping, sessile leaves and spiny branches distinguish this species from its nearest congeners.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
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