Eriogonum ursinum |
Eriogonum ursinum var. ursinum |
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bear buckwheat, Bear Valley buckwheat, Bear Valley wild buckwheat |
bear buckwheat, Bear Valley buckwheat, Bear Valley wild buckwheat |
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Habit | Herbs, spreading, matted, synoecious, 0.5–4 × (1.5–)2–8(–12), thinly tomen-tose to floccose or glabrate. | Plants 0.5–4 × 3–6 dm. | ||||
Stems | caudex spreading; aerial flowering stems erect, slender, solid, not fistulose, arising at nodes of caudex branches and at distal nodes of short, non-flowering aerial branches, 0.4–4 dm, thinly tomentose to floccose or glabrate. |
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Aerial flowering stems | 0.4–4 dm, thinly tomentose to glabrate. |
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Leaves | in rather compact basal rosettes; petiole 0.1–1.5 cm, tomentose; blade elliptic, 0.7–2(–2.2) × 0.4–1(–1.2) cm, or ovate, 0.8–1.4(–2.5) × 0.5–1.2(–2) cm, densely white- or rufous-tomentose abaxially, thinly tomentose, sparsely floccose, or glabrous and greenish adaxially, margins slightly wavy. |
petiole 0.1–0.5(–0.8) cm; blade ovate, 0.8–1.4(–2.5) × 0.5–1.2(–2) cm, densely white- or rufous-tomentose abaxially, thinly tomentose or glabrous and greenish adaxially. |
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Inflorescences | compound-umbellate, 1–3(–6) × 1–5 cm, thinly tomentose to glabrate; bracts: proximal 3–8, lanceolate to narrowly elliptic, 0.5–2 × 0.25–1 cm, distal 3, semileaflike, midway along branch, linear to narrowly lanceolate, 0.7–1 × 0.1–0.25 cm, or ± scalelike below involucre, 1–5 mm. |
thinly tomentose to glabrate; proximal bracts 3–8, lanceolate, 0.5–1.5(–2) × 0.3–1 cm, distal bracts scalelike, not midway along branch, 1–5 mm. |
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Involucres | 1 per node, turbinate to turbinate-campanulate, 3.5–8 × 2.5–4 mm, villous; teeth 5–8, erect, 0.5–2 mm. |
turbinate, 3.5–4.5(–5) × 2.5–4 mm. |
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Flowers | 5–7 mm at anthesis, 6.5–9 mm in fruit, including 0.5–0.8 mm stipelike base, with perianth cream or rarely yellow, suffused with blush of pinkish red to maroon, glabrous, or flowers 4–6 mm, including 1–1.3 mm stipelike base, with perianth pale yellow or rarely yellow, not suffused with blush of color glabrous; tepals slightly dimorphic or monomorphic, broadly ovate or obovate; stamens exserted, 3–5 mm; filaments pilose proximally. |
4–6 mm at anthesis, 5–6 mm in fruit; perianth pale yellow, rarely yellow, not suffused with blush of color. |
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Achenes | light brown, (5–)5.5–8 mm or 3–3.5 mm, glabrous except for sparsely pubescent beak. |
3–3.5 mm. |
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Eriogonum ursinum |
Eriogonum ursinum var. ursinum |
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Phenology | Flowering May–Sep. | |||||
Habitat | Sandy to gravelly, mostly volcanic flats and slopes, oak and montane conifer woodlands | |||||
Elevation | (500-)900-2500(-2800) m ((1600-)3000-8200(-9200) ft) | |||||
Distribution |
CA
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CA |
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Discussion | Varieties 2 (2 in the flora). (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Variety ursinum is rather common in the northern Sierra Nevada (Lassen, Nevada, Placer, Plumas, Shasta, and Sierra counties), with a series of disjunct populations on the Trinity-Tehama-Shasta county lines. A low-elevation population (Hutchinson et al. 2693, JEPS) is known from near Pulga along the Feather River in Butte County. Bear Valley wild buckwheat forms large, colorful mats on the forest floor, with rather compact but compound umbels of pale yellow flowers. The plants do well in the garden. A specimen (T. J. Howell s.n., NY) supposedly gathered somewhere in Oregon is discounted as to location. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 5, p. 358. | FNA vol. 5, p. 358. | ||||
Parent taxa | Polygonaceae > subfam. Eriogonoideae > Eriogonum > subg. Oligogonum | Polygonaceae > subfam. Eriogonoideae > Eriogonum > subg. Oligogonum > Eriogonum ursinum | ||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||
Synonyms | E. ovatum | |||||
Name authority | S. Watson: Proc. Amer. Acad. Arts 10: 347. (1875) | unknown | ||||
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