The green links below add additional plants to the comparison table. Blue links lead to other Web sites.
enable glossary links

sand-carpet, sand-mat

Stems

often forming dense mats, 5–30+ cm, often obscured by stipules and dense pubescence.

Leaves

stipules 1–8 mm, often nearly as long as leaves, lobes acuminate;

blade 2-grooved, 5–13 mm, apex finely spinose, glabrous.

Flowers

densely woolly, hairs 0.5–1.5 mm;

sepals 5, margins fimbriate, awn 1.5–4 mm;

staminodes white, 0.3–0.5 mm.

Seeds

1.4–1.6 mm.

Utricles

apex apiculate.

Cardionema ramosissimum

Phenology Flowering spring–early summer.
Habitat Sandy beaches, grassy bluffs, sand dunes
Elevation 0-200 m (0-700 ft)
Distribution
from FNA
CA; OR; WA; Mexico; South America (Chile, Ecuador, Peru)
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

The flowers are burlike in fruit with the utricle enclosed in the rigid, persistent calyx, the presumed unit of seed dispersal.

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

Source FNA vol. 5, p. 46.
Parent taxa Caryophyllaceae > subfam. Paronychioideae > Cardionema
Synonyms Loeflingia ramosissima
Name authority (Weinmann) A. Nelson & J. F. Macbride: Bot. Gaz. 56: 473. (1913)
Web links