Flora of North America species comparison

prostrate or decumbent to spreading or erect, sometimes scapose, rarely absent (Eriogonum), without recurved spines, glabrous or pubescent, sometimes glandular;

nodes not swollen;

tendrils absent;

caudex stems tightly compact to spreading and at or just below the soil surface or spreading to erect and above the soil surface, woody;

aerial flowering stems decumbent to spreading or erect, arising at nodes of caudex branches, at distal nodes of aerial branches, or directly from the root, slender to stout and solid or slightly to distinctly fistulose, rarely disarticulating in ringlike segments (Eriogonum).

basal;

petiole (0.5–)1–3(–4) cm;

blade oblanceolate, (0.5–)1–5(–7) × (0.3–)0.4–0.7(–1) cm, villous.

deciduous (persistent in some shrubby and matted Eriogonum species), basal or basal and cauline, rarely only cauline, rosulate, alternate, or infrequently opposite (Goodmania) or in whorls of 3 (Gilmania);

stipules absent (possibly vestigial in some perennial species of Chorizanthe);

petiole present, sometimes indistinct, not articulate or with extrafloral nectaries;

blade simple, rarely lobed (Pterostegia), rarely awn-tipped (Goodmania).

rather dense with secondary branches suppressed, grayish;

bracts 2, similar to leaf blades at proximal nodes only reduced, short-petiolate, becoming linear and aciculate at distal nodes, acerose, 0.5–7 cm × 2–7 mm, awns 0.5–1.2 mm.

terminal or terminal and axillary, cymose and dichotomously or trichotomously branched, or racemose, simple or compound umbellate, or capitate;

bracts usually connate proximally, leaflike or scalelike, entire apically, sometimes awn-tipped, glabrous or pubescent.

absent or erect to deflexed relative to inflorescence branch, sometimes reflexed, straight or curved.

1, grayish, cylindric, often ventricose basally, 2–2.5(–3) mm, with distinct, white to pink or purple, scarious margins extending nearly full length of awn, corrugate, villous abaxially;

teeth spreading, equal, 0.5–1.5 mm;

awns uncinate with longer ones 2–3 mm and alternating with shorter (1–1.5 mm) ones.

exserted;

perianth bicolored with floral tube white and tepals white to rose, cylindric, 2–3.5 mm, pubescent abaxially;

tepals connate less than 1/4 their length, monomorphic, obovate to oblong, acute to truncate and erose apically;

stamens 9, slightly exserted;

filaments distinct, 2–3 mm, glabrous;

anthers cream to rose, ovate, 0.3–0.4 mm.

(1–)2–30(–100) per involucral structure, occasionally with stipelike base distal to articulations (Eriogonum);

perianth accrescent in fruit, mostly white to red, yellow, light green, greenish white, maroon, or purple, urceolate to campanulate, occasionally glandular or pustulose abaxially, nearly always minutely glandular along midvein adaxially, glabrous or pubescent;

tepals (5–)6, in 2 whorls of 3, connate proximally, typically not forming tube (except Chorizanthe, Lastarriaea, Mucronea, Pterostegia), petaloid or, rarely, coriaceous (Lastarriaea), monomorphic or dimorphic, entire, emarginate, or lobed to laciniate apically, rarely awn-tipped (Lastarriaea) or apiculate (Eriogonum);

nectary a disk at base of ovary;

stamens 3, 6, or 9 (variously 3–9 in Chorizanthe, Mucronea);

staminodes absent;

filaments usually distinct, occasionally forming staminal tube (Chorizanthe);

pistils 3-carpellate, homostylous;

ovary 1-locular;

ovule 1, orthotropous, placentation basal;

styles 3, distinct;

stigmas capitate.

dark brown, globose-lenticular, 2–2.5 mm.

brown to black or maroon, homocarpic, winged or unwinged, 3-gonous, less often lenticular or globose-lenticular to globose.

embryo straight or curved.

structures tubular (involucre) or consisting of a series of individual bractlike lobes (involucral bracts) arranged in whorls or spirals, rarely absent (Gilmania), awns present or absent;

involucre cylindric, prismatic, turbinate, campanulate, urceolate, or funnelform with 3–8(–36) usually erect teeth or 4–12 spreading to reflexed lobes (teeth and lobes are distal portions of proximally connate involucral bracts);

involucral bracts in 1–3 whorls, rarely in spirals (Johanneshowellia), free or connate only at base, linear to oblanceolate or ovate.