Eriogonum latifolium |
Eriogonum pauciflorum |
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coast buckwheat, coast wild buckwheat, seaside buckwheat, seaside wild buckwheat |
few-flower wild buckwheat, fewflower buckwheat, manybranch eriogonum |
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Habit | Subshrubs or herbs, often scapose, much-branched and matted, 2–7 × 5–20 dm, usually tomentose to floccose, rarely glabrous. | Herbs, loosely matted, usually scapose, 0.5–2 × 0.5–3 dm, tomentose, grayish. |
Stems | spreading to erect, with persistent leaf bases, up to 1/4 height of plant; caudex stems matted; aerial flowering stems often scapelike, erect to spreading or decumbent, usually stout, solid, not fistulose, 2–6 dm, usually tomentose to floccose, rarely glabrous. |
spreading, usually with persistent leaf bases, up to 1/4 height of plant; caudex stems matted; aerial flowering stems scapelike, erect or nearly so, slender, solid, not fistulose, 0.3–2 dm, tomentose. |
Leaves | cauline; petiole 2–6(–10) cm, tomentose; blade oblong to ovate, (1.5–)2.5–5 × 1.5–4 cm, white-lanate to tawny-tomentose on both surfaces, or tomentose to floccose or glabrous and green adaxially, margins plane, occasionally crisped. |
fasciculate in terminal tufts, sometimes 1 per node and sheathing up stem 1–5 cm; petiole 1–5 cm, tomentose to lanate; blade linear-oblanceolate to oblanceolate or narrowly spatulate to elliptic, 1–4 × 0.1–1 cm, grayish- or whitish-tomentose abaxially, less so to subglabrous (or rarely glabrous) adaxially or white-lanate on both surfaces, margins plane. |
Inflorescences | capitate to umbellate or cymose, 3–40 × 2–20 cm; branches usually tomentose to floccose, rarely glabrous; bracts usually 3, leaflike, oblong to ovate, and 5–20 × 5–15 mm proximally, scalelike, triangular, and 2–5 mm distally. |
capitate, subcapitate, or cymose-umbellate, 1–5 × 1–2 cm; branches absent or dichotomous; bracts 2–6, linear to lanceolate, scalelike to semileaflike, 1.5–20 × 1–5 mm. |
Peduncles | absent. |
absent. |
Involucres | (3–)5–20 per cluster, turbinate, 3.5–5(–6) × 2–4 mm, tomentose or glabrous; teeth 5–6, erect, 0.3–0.6 mm. |
1 per node or 2–5(–7) per cluster, narrowly turbinate, (3.5–)4–5 × (1.5–)2–3 mm, rigid, floccose to tomentose; teeth 5, erect, 0.5–0.8 mm. |
Flowers | 3–3.5 mm; perianth white to pink or rose, glabrous; tepals connate proximal 1/4, monomorphic, obovate; stamens exserted, 3–6 mm; filaments pilose proximally. |
2–2.5 mm; perianth whitish brown to rose, pubescent, rarely glabrous; tepals connate proximal 1/3, monomorphic, oblong; stamens exserted, 2.5–3 mm; filaments pilose proximally. |
Achenes | brown, 3.5–4 mm, glabrous. |
light brown to brown, 2–2.5 mm, glabrous. |
2n | = 40. |
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Eriogonum latifolium |
Eriogonum pauciflorum |
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Phenology | Flowering year-round. | Flowering May–Sep. |
Habitat | Sandy coastal flats, slopes, bluffs, and mesas, coastal scrub and grassland communities | Clay to gravelly flats, washes, and slopes, grassland and sagebrush communities, juniper woodlands |
Elevation | 0-80(-200) m (0-300(-700) ft) | 600-1800 m (2000-5900 ft) |
Distribution |
CA; OR
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CO; MT; ND; NE; SD; WY; MB; SK
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Discussion | Eriogonum latifolium is found along the immediate coast of southwest Oregon (Curry County) and western California (Alameda, Contra Costa, Del Norte, Humboldt, Marin, Mendocino, Monterey, San Francisco, San Luis Obispo, San Mateo, Santa Cruz, and Sonoma counties). The species is rather variable as to size and aspect, these depending to a considerable degree on exposure to on-shore winds. The flowering stems are rarely glabrous, but plants with this expression are always intermixed with plants having tomentose to floccose stems. The brilliantly white-lanate, spreading shrubs become rather globose in shape under cultivation, and as a result make an attractive addition to the garden, especially as the flowers wither through various shades of pink to rose. The species should be used much more than at present in places where cool summer temperatures, good moisture, and sandy soils are available. A decoction consisting of the roots, leaves, and stems of Eriogonum latifolium was taken by various Native American people along the California coast for colds and coughs (B. R. Bocek 1984; D. E. Moerman 1986). V. K. Chestnut (1902) reported that the native people of Mendocino County, California, used a decoction of the roots for stomach pain, “female complaints,” and sore eyes. The species is the food plant for the bramble hairstreak butterfly (Callophrys viridis), Mormon metalmark (Apodemia mormo), western square-dotted blue (Euphilotes comstocki comstocki), and the federally endangered Smith’s dotted-blue (Euphilotes enoptes smithi). (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Eriogonum pauciflorum is the common, matted wild buckwheat on the Great Plains. The species occurs in southern Manitoba and Saskatchewan, northeastern Colorado, Montana, western Nebraska, North Dakota, Nebraska, South Dakota, and Wyoming. Plants from southeastern Wyoming, northeastern Colorado and western Nebraska have somewhat broader leaf blades (spatulate to elliptic rather than linear-oblanceolate to oblanceolate) that are densely tomentose to lanate on both surfaces (rather than loosely tomentose abaxially and less so or glabrous adaxially). Such plants have been distinguished as var. gnaphalodes. This expression would be worthy of a place in the rock garden. A hybrid between var. pauciflorum and E. effusum has been named E. ×nebraskense Rydberg (see 2. E. effusum). The hybrid is known from Weld County, Colorado, Cheyenne, Dawes, Kimball, and Sioux counties, Nebraska, and Converse and Platte counties, Wyoming. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Source | FNA vol. 5, p. 314. | FNA vol. 5, p. 284. |
Parent taxa | Polygonaceae > subfam. Eriogonoideae > Eriogonum > subg. Eucycla | Polygonaceae > subfam. Eriogonoideae > Eriogonum > subg. Eucycla |
Sibling taxa | ||
Synonyms | E. depauperatum, E. gnaphalodes, E. multiceps, E. pauciflorum var. gnaphalodes | |
Name authority | Smith: in A. Rees, Cycl. 13(2): Eriogonum no. 3. (1809) | Pursh: Fl. Amer. Sept. 2: 735. (1813) |
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