Phemeranthus parviflorus
Phemeranthus aurantiacus
sunbright
orange fameflower
± erect, simple or branching, sometimes suffrutescent.
erect, simple or branching, slender to stout, sometimes suffrutescent.
sessile;
blade terete, sometimes slightly broadened at base, to 5 cm.
subsessile;
blade narrowly planate, linear to narrowly lanceolate or rarely oblanceolate, to 6 cm, base attenuate.
cymose, much overtopping leaves;
peduncle scapelike, to 15 cm.
flowers usually solitary, sometimes in 2–3-flowered cymules.
usually pedicellate, sometimes sessile or subsessile;
sepals deciduous or sometimes persistent, ovate, to 4.5 mm, apex sometimes purplish, acuminate-cornate, thickened;
petals light pink to purplish, elliptic to obovate, to 7 mm;
stamens (4–)5(–6);
stigma 1, subcapitate, sometimes stigmas 3-lobed, or 3, triangular.
sepals deciduous, ovate, sometimes cuspidate, 5–10 mm;
petals yellow or orange, sometimes reddish, rarely pinkish, obovate, 9–15(–25) mm;
stamens usually 20–30;
stigmas 3, linear;
pedicel often recurving in fruit.
ellipsoid or sometimes ovoid, sometimes obtusely trigonous, 3–5 mm.
ovoid to globose, 4–7 mm.
without arcuate ridges, 0.8–1 mm.
with arcuate ridges, 1.2(–1.7) mm.
= 24, 48.
Phemeranthus parviflorus
Phemeranthus aurantiacus
Over its extensive range, Phemeranthus parviflorus varies considerably in several characters, including overall size. Although this variation is more or less continuous, correlating very generally with habitat type and geographic location, some populations that are found toward the limits of the species’ range and that exhibit combinations of tendencies to extremes in the variable characters have been recognized separately. The Alabama populations, few and confined to a very small area on gneiss in the central part of the state, disjunct from the main trans-Mississippi distribution of P. parviflorus, with elongate stems, small flowers, and stigmas often three-lobed, or three instead of one, have been described as Talinum appalachianum. Plants from Arizona with stems slender and tending to elongate, sepals acuminate-cornate and usually purplish, and capsules ovoid have been described as T. gooddingii. Plants from the mountains of New Mexico with elongate stems, subsessile flowers, markedly congested cymes, and acuminate, often persistent sepals have been described as T. confertiflorum (P. confertiflorus).
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
A cladistic analysis of chloroplast ndhF sequence data (W. L. Applequist and R. S. Wallace 2001) indicated that Phemeranthus aurantiacus belongs in the same clade as Talinum paniculatum (Jacquin) Gaertner and the two other species of that genus that were sampled, rather than in a separate and rather distant clade containing P. mengesii, the only other species of Phemeranthus included in the study. The molecular evidence, together with the planate leaves and extended stem of P. aurantiacus, which are anomalous in Phemeranthus, suggest that perhaps this species should be restored to Talinum. However, in fruit and seed characters, the chief morphological bases on which Talinum and Phemeranthus are distinguished, P. aurantiacus clearly belongs in the latter.
Talinum angustissimum often has been held separate from Phemeranthus aurantiacus (T. aurantiacum), but the supposed distinctions break down in a continuum of intergradation, the other extreme of which was described as T. whitei. The former extreme, centered in southern Arizona, has yellow petals, very narrow leaves, slender stems, and small, globose capsules; the latter, centered in southern Chihuahua and northern Durango, has orange to reddish petals, broad leaves, stout stems, and large, ovoid capsules. The name T. lineare Kunth, which properly applies to a species from central Mexico, has been misapplied to some collections of P. aurantiacus from Texas.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
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