Euphorbia cyathophora |
Euphorbia abramsiana |
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fire on the mountain, painted leaf, painted poinsettia |
Abrams' sandmat, Abrams' spurge |
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Habit | Herbs, annual, with spreading taproots. | Herbs, annual, with slender taproot. |
Stems | erect or ascending, 20–100 cm, glabrous, sparsely pilose, or puberulent; branches ± straight. |
prostrate, mat-forming, 10–35(–50) cm, shortly pilose or puberulent at least proximally, often glabrous distally. |
Leaves | usually alternate, occasionally opposite proximally; petiole 2–20 mm, glabrous or pilose, or often hispid abaxially near blade junction; blade linear, lanceolate, elliptic, or wider leaves pandurate and unequally 4-lobed, occasionally polymorphic on single plants, 15–250 × 4–40 mm, base acute to cuneate, margins subulately glandular-serrulate distally, or sparsely glandular and subentire, hirtellous to glabrate, flat to revolute, apex acute to cuneate, abaxial surface sparsely pilose or glabrate, adaxial surface glabrous or sparsely puberulent; venation pinnate, midvein prominent. |
opposite; stipules distinct, divided into 5–7 subulate-filiform segments, 0.6–1.1 mm, usually glabrous, rarely pilose; petiole 0.5–1 mm, glabrous; blade ovate, elliptic-oblong, or slightly ovate-cordate, 3–11 × 2–5 mm, base asymmetric, truncate to hemicordate, margins serrulate at least toward apex, often entire toward base, apex acute to obtuse, surfaces sometimes with red spot in center, glabrous; usually only the midvein conspicuous. |
Involucre | campanulate, occasionally broadly so, 1.8–2.8 × 2.2–2.8 mm, glabrous; involucral lobes triangularly 3–5 lobed; gland 1, yellow-green, sessile to substipitate and narrowly to broadly attached, 1–1.4 × 0.9–1.6 mm, opening oblong (flattened without pressing), without annular rim, glabrous; appendages absent. |
obconic, 0.5–0.6 × 0.4–0.5 mm, glabrous; glands 4, yellowish to pink, circular to oblong, 0.1 × 0.1–0.2 mm; appendages absent, or white to pink, semicircular to broadly ovate, to 0.1 × 0.2 mm, distal margin entire or shallowly lobed. |
Staminate flowers | 7–20. |
3–5. |
Pistillate flowers | ovary glabrous; styles 1.6 mm, 2-fid nearly entire length. |
ovary glabrous; styles 0.1–0.3 mm, 2-fid nearly entire length. |
Capsules | green, depressed-globose to ellipsoid, 2.8–3.2 × 4–4.5 mm, 3-lobed, glabrous; columella 2–2.7 mm. |
ellipsoid to ovoid, 1.3–1.5 × 1.1–1.5 mm, glabrous; columella 1–1.3 mm. |
Seeds | black to ashy gray or light brown, cylindric to ovoid, rounded in cross section, 2.3–3.1 × 1.9–2.5 mm, uniformly tuberculate or tubercles arranged in median, transverse ridge in cylindric seeds; caruncle absent. |
light gray to light brown, narrowly ovoid to ovoid, 4-angled in cross section, 1–1.2 × 0.6–0.7 mm, with 3–5 prominent transverse ridges that often interrupt abaxial keel. |
Cyathial | arrangement: terminal pleiochasial branches (1–)3, 1–2-branched; pleiochasial bracts 2–3(–4), often as tight, involucrate whorl, usually green with white, pink, or red at base, occasionally distal bracts wholly white, pink, or red, rarely all bracts wholly green, similar in shape and size to distal leaves; dichasial bracts often colored, similar in shape and size to distal stem leaves or highly reduced. |
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Cyathia | peduncle 1.6–2.8 mm. |
solitary at distal nodes of primary stems or at nodes of short congested axillary branchlets; peduncle 0.2–0.5 mm. |
2n | = 28, 56. |
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Euphorbia cyathophora |
Euphorbia abramsiana |
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Phenology | Flowering and fruiting late spring–fall. | Flowering and fruiting summer–fall. |
Habitat | Bottomland forests, stream and river banks, bases of bluffs, fallow fields, roadsides, open disturbed areas. | Desert scrub and desert grasslands. |
Elevation | 0–1800 m. (0–5900 ft.) | -40–1400 m. (-100–4600 ft.) |
Distribution |
AL; AR; CA; FL; GA; IA; IL; IN; KS; KY; LA; MD; MN; MO; MS; NC; NE; NM; OH; OK; SC; SD; TN; TX; UT; VA; WI; Mexico; Central America; South America; West Indies [Introduced in Eurasia, Africa, Indian Ocean Islands, Pacific Islands, Australia]
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AZ; CA; NM; TX; Mexico (Baja California, Baja California Sur, Sonora)
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Discussion | Euphorbia cyathophora is native to the midwestern and southeastern United States, Mexico, the West Indies, and northern South America. Leaf shape can be polymorphic on individuals of this species, but not to the extent as in E. heterophylla. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Source | FNA vol. 12, p. 319. | FNA vol. 12, p. 259. |
Parent taxa | Euphorbiaceae > Euphorbia > sect. Poinsettia | Euphorbiaceae > Euphorbia > sect. Anisophyllum |
Sibling taxa | ||
Synonyms | Poinsettia cyathophora | Chamaesyce abramsiana |
Name authority | Murray: Commentat. Soc. Regiae Sci. Gott. 7: 81, plate 1. (1786) | L. C. Wheeler: Bull. S. Calif. Acad. Sci. 33: 109. (1934) |
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