Flora of North America species comparison

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Marah macrocarpa

Chilicothe, Cucamonga manroot, large-fruit manroot, wild cucumber
Leaf

blades deeply 5(–7)-lobed, 5–30 cm wide.
Flowers

sepals (pistillate) deltate, 0.4–0.6 mm, sometimes vestigial;

petals (1–)3–10(–12) mm (pistillate) or 5–8(–10) mm (staminate), corolla white, shallowly cupulate to rotate;

staminodia scalelike or absent in pistillate flowers.
Capsules

yellowish green at maturity, short-ellipsoid to broadly ovoid, usually rounded at both ends, sometimes sharply beaked, (5–)8–12 cm, surface densely echinate, spinules rigid, 5–30 mm.
Seeds

4–20(–24), usually obovate to oblong-elliptic, sometimes subglobose, not flat at one end, slightly compressed, 15–20 mm.
2n

= 32, 64.

Marah macrocarpa
Phenology Flowering (Jan–)Mar–May.
Habitat Pinyon-juniper woodlands, Joshua tree-pinyon transition zones, coastal sage, chaparral, oak woodlands, rocky hillsides, riparian woods and thickets, stream bottoms, disturbed sites, roadsides
Elevation 0–1500(–2100) m (0–4900(–6900) ft)
Distribution
from FNA
CA; Mexico (Baja California, Baja California Sur)
[WildflowerSearch map]
Discussion

K. M. Stocking (1955b) enlarged Marah macrocarpa to include M. micrantha Dunn [as M. macrocarpa var. micrantha (Dunn) Stocking], which is known only from

Cedros Island off the Pacific coast of Baja California, outside of Vizcaíno Bay. But the relatively small flowers and seeds of the latter [staminate flowers 3–6(–8) mm diam. versus 8–13 mm diam.; seeds 12–13 mm versus 15–20 mm] and its apparent geographical disjunction suggest that treatment of M. micrantha at specific rank is justified.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Source FNA vol. 6, p. 24.
Parent taxa Cucurbitaceae > Marah
Sibling taxa
M. fabacea, M. gilensis, M. guadalupensis, M. horrida, M. oregana, M. watsonii
Synonyms Echinocystis macrocarpa
Name authority (Greene) Greene: Leafl. Bot. Observ. Crit. 2: 36. (1910)
Web links 
Unless otherwise noted, all data comes from the online version of the Flora of North America, who have made most of their content available via a Creative Commons license (CC BY 4.0).



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