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Habit Herbs usually annual, sometimes perennial, strigillose throughout and villous distally, especially on flower parts; from a taproot, when perennial sometimes lateral roots producing adventitious shoots. Herbs (annual or perennial), [shrubs].
Stems

single to several from base, usually unbranched.

Leaves

basal rosette usually present at anthesis, 3–5(–7.8) × 0.4–0.8(–1.2) cm;

blade narrowly lanceolate to oblong, margins pinnatifid or dentate.

alternate or basal;

stipules absent.

Flowers

buds with free tips 0–0.2 mm;

floral tube 20–30 mm;

sepals 10–18 mm;

petals 10–20 mm.

usually actinomorphic, rarely slightly zygomorphic (in Oenothera), (3 or)4-merous;

stamens 2 times as many, or rarely as many, as sepals;

pollen usually shed in monads, rarely tetrads (Chylismia sect. Lignothera).

Fruit

a dry capsule, usually dehiscent, sometimes indehiscent.

Capsules

spreading to reflexed, straight or contorted.

Seeds

few to numerous, without hairs or wings, [very rarely with asymmetrical dry wing (Xylonagra)], or with dry (Oenothera), erose or smooth wing, or with thick, papillate wings (Chylismiella).

2n

= 14.

Oenothera pallida subsp. trichocalyx

Onagraceae tribe Onagreae

Phenology Flowering (Apr–)May–Jun.
Habitat Sandy, silty, or rocky soil in pinyon-juniper woodlands or shrublands, with Artemisia and Ericameria.
Elevation 1100–2500 m. (3600–8200 ft.)
Distribution
from FNA
AZ; CO; NM; UT; WY
[BONAP county map]
North America; Mexico; Central America; South America; West Indies
Discussion

Subspecies trichocalyx occurs across central to southern Wyoming, eastern Utah, western Colorado, northeastern Arizona, and northwestern New Mexico. Within its range it has slight overlap with subspp. pallida and runcinata. In its purest form, subsp. trichocalyx is the most distinctive phase of Oenothera pallida, but many of the populations have characteristics that approach other subspecies with perennial habit (versus annual) appearing occasionally. Plants that are glabrous, or nearly so, like subsp. pallida, but with apparent short-duration habit and divided leaves like subsp. trichocalyx, occur in southern Wyoming and in the Uinta Basin region of Utah; only more typical plants of subsp. trichocalyx otherwise occur in the region without any current evidence of the presence of subsp. pallida.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

Genera 13, species 265 (12 genera, 199 species in the flora).

Onagreae account for more than half the total genera in Onagraceae and diversified from a center in southwestern North America (L. Katinas et al. 2004). Delimitation of the tribe by W. L. Wagner et al. (2007) differs from previous ones by the exclusion of Gongylocarpus, now in its own tribe, by the segregation of eight genera (Camissoniopsis, Chylismia, Chylismiella, Eremothera, Eulobus, Neoholmgrenia, Taraxia, and Tetrapteron) from Camissonia, and by the inclusion of three previously separate genera (Calylophus, Gaura, and Stenosiphon) in Oenothera. Within the branch of the family that lacks stipules (Gongylocarpeae, Epilobieae, and Onagreae), the last two tribes form a clade that has very strong molecular support (R. A. Levin et al. 2003, 2004), but no obvious morphological synapomorphy. The clade may be defined by a cytogenetic change from the base chromosome number of x = 11 found in Circaeeae, Gongylocarpeae, and Lopezieae, to x = 18 in Epilobieae, and x = 7 in Onagreae; however, these changes could also have occurred independently. Other than the new chromosome number x = 7, the only apparent morphological synapomorphy for Onagreae alone is pollen with prominent apertural protrusions (J. Praglowski et al. 1987, 1989), a character state also found in Circaeeae (Praglowski et al. 1994). The monophyly of Onagreae has moderate (Levin et al. 2004) to strong support (V. S. Ford and L. D. Gottlieb 2007).

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

Source FNA vol. 10. FNA vol. 10.
Parent taxa Onagraceae > subfam. Onagroideae > tribe Onagreae > Oenothera > sect. Anogra > Oenothera pallida Onagraceae > subfam. Onagroideae
Sibling taxa
O. pallida subsp. latifolia, O. pallida subsp. pallida, O. pallida subsp. runcinata
Subordinate taxa
Synonyms O. trichocalyx, Anogra rhizomata, A. trichocalyx, A. violacea, A. vreelandii, O. albicaulis var. trichocalyx, O. pallida var. trichocalyx
Name authority (Nuttall) Munz & W. M. Klein in N. L. Britton et al.: N. Amer. Fl., ser. 2, 5: 119. (1965) Dumortier: Fl. Belg., 89. (1827)
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