Atriplex suberecta |
Atriplex argentea |
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peregrine saltbush, sprawling saltbush |
maidenhair spleenwort, silver orach, silver orache, silver saltbush, silverscale, silverscale orache, silverscale saltbush, silvery orache |
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Habit | Herbs, annual or perennial, sprawling to ascending, 2–6 dm, branching from densely scaly base. | Herbs, simple or freely branched, 0.5–6 dm; branches rather stout, angled, scurfy when young. | ||||||||||||||||
Leaves | mostly alternate, shortly petiolate; blade narrow to broadly rhomboid, lanceolate, oblanceolate, or elliptic, (8–)12–35(–42) × 6–16 mm, thin, margin coarsely and irregularly dentate, glabrescent adaxially, somewhat scurfy abaxially. |
often opposite proximally, petiolate or distal bracteate ones subsessile, blade lance-ovate, lanceolate, deltoid, or cordate, 5–75 × 4–50(–75) mm, base subhastate or obtuse to acute, margin entire or essentially so, sometimes closely repand-dentate, apex obtuse to acute or rounded, scurfy (glabrous). |
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Flowers | in axillary glomerules and terminal, interrupted spikes. |
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Staminate flowers | in subterminal, axillary glomerules. |
borne in distal axils, or in short dense spikes or panicles, or intermixed with pistillate, with 4–5-parted calyx. |
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Pistillate flowers | in axillary glomerules. |
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Seeds | circular. |
brown, 1.5–2 mm wide; radicle superior or lateral. |
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Fruiting | bracteoles sessile or on the stipe to 0.5 mm, rhombic to obovate, almost flat to convex, 2.2–4 × 1.7–2.7 mm, thin or somewhat thickened in age, connate in basal 1/2, margin entire in basal 1/2, 2–4-toothed in distal 1/2, apex acute, scurfy. |
bracteoles sessile, subsessile, or stipitate (stipe 0.5–5 mm), cuneate-orbicular, (2.5–)4–11.2 × 2–8.8(–14) mm, margin foliaceous below apex, subentire or dentate to laciniate, face smooth, tuberculate, or crested, processes sometimes again toothed, teeth then aligned with axis of process. |
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2n | = 18. |
= 18, 36, 54. |
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Atriplex suberecta |
Atriplex argentea |
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Phenology | Flowering summer–fall. | |||||||||||||||||
Habitat | Disturbed places, with other ruderal weeds | |||||||||||||||||
Elevation | 10-900 m (0-3000 ft) | |||||||||||||||||
Distribution |
CA; UT; Australia; naturalized South Africa [Introduced in North America]
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AZ; CA; CO; ID; KS; MT; ND; NE; NM; NV; OK; OR; SD; TX; UT; WA; WY; AB; BC; MB; SK; Mexico
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Discussion | Varieties 5 (5 in the flora). Herbarium materials have tended to represent a catchall for annual specimens not readily assignable to other taxa. Indeed, the distinguishing features of the Atriplex argentea complex are shared singly and often in combination with other taxa. Only by use of combinations of features can this taxon be defined. Those features, with much variation, center around the broad, typically ovate to deltoid leaf blades (often definitely 3-veined) and more-or-less compressed, sessile to subsessile (or short stipitate), fruiting bracteoles on which the marginal processes, or teeth, are mainly aligned with the plane compression, and with the faces quite smooth to variously appendaged. Still some specimens are apparently intermediate with other species, especially with the closely allied A. saccaria, with which it is at least partially sympatric. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 4, p. 343. | FNA vol. 4. | ||||||||||||||||
Parent taxa | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Atriplex > sect. Semibaccata | Chenopodiaceae > Atriplex > subg. Obione > sect. Obione > subsect. Argenteae | ||||||||||||||||
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Subordinate taxa | ||||||||||||||||||
Synonyms | Obione argentea | |||||||||||||||||
Name authority | I. Verdoorn: Bothalia 6: 418, figs. 2, 3(2). (1954) | Nuttall: Gen. N. Amer. Pl. 1: 198. (1818) | ||||||||||||||||
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