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bracteate orach, bractscale, saltscale, stinking orach

Habit Herbs, annual, erect or sprawling, usually branched often forming tangled mats to 10 × (3–)5–20 dm, ascending branches sparsely scurfy.
Leaves

many, subsessile or very short petiolate;

blade subconcolorous, lanceolate to oblong, elliptic, or oval, (8–)10–30(–40) × 3–12(–15) mm, margin sharply dentate to entire.

Staminate flowers

in glomerules in terminal spikes or panicles 3–20 cm, or reduced to solitary, rounded, terminal glomerule.

Pistillate flower

in small clusters, axillary.

Seeds

brown, 1–1.3(–1.5) mm.

Fruiting

bracteoles sessile or subsessile (stipe to 1 mm), cuneate-orbicular to obovate, somewhat compressed, 2.1–3.5 × (1.7–)2–3.7 mm, united 1/2 of length, margin sharply and often slenderly toothed beyond middle, faces often rather strongly veined, smooth or with 1 or more slender or flattened appendages.

2n

= 18.

Atriplex serenana

Distribution
from FNA
CA; NV; nw Mexico
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Varieties 2 (2 in the flora).

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

Key
1. Staminate inflorescence an elongate panicle or spike bearing numerous, beadlike glomerules; fruiting bracteoles ± 1-veined; mainly of central valley and Owens Valley, to w Nevada, also coastal and insu- lar, s California
var. serenana
1. Staminate inflorescence of solitary, terminal, subglobose glomerule; fruiting bracteoles 3-veined; coastal s California
var. davidsonii
Source FNA vol. 4, p. 361.
Parent taxa Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Obione > sect. Obione > subsect. Arenariae
Sibling taxa
A. acanthocarpa, A. amnicola, A. argentea, A. californica, A. canescens, A. confertifolia, A. cordulata, A. coronata, A. corrugata, A. coulteri, A. covillei, A. dioica, A. elegans, A. fruticulosa, A. gardneri, A. garrettii, A. glabriuscula, A. gmelinii, A. graciliflora, A. heterosperma, A. holocarpa, A. hortensis, A. hymenelytra, A. joaquiniana, A. klebergorum, A. laciniata, A. lentiformis, A. leucophylla, A. lindleyi, A. linearis, A. littoralis, A. matamorensis, A. mucronata, A. nudicaulis, A. nummularia, A. oblongifolia, A. obovata, A. pacifica, A. parishii, A. parryi, A. patula, A. pentandra, A. phyllostegia, A. pleiantha, A. polycarpa, A. powellii, A. prostrata, A. pusilla, A. rosea, A. saccaria, A. semibaccata, A. spinifera, A. suberecta, A. suckleyi, A. tatarica, A. torreyi, A. truncata, A. tularensis, A. watsonii, A. wolfii, A. wrightii
Subordinate taxa
A. serenana var. davidsonii, A. serenana var. serenana
Name authority A. Nelson ex Abrams: Fl. Los Angeles, 128. (1904)
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