Spergularia macrotheca |
Spergularia macrotheca var. leucantha |
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beach sand-spurrey, beach sand-spurry, sticky sand spurry, sticky sand-spurrey |
sticky sandspurry, white sticky sand spurry |
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Habit | Plants strongly perennial with branched, woody base, stout, 5–40 cm, densely stipitate-glandular in inflorescence or throughout. | Plants 10–40 cm. | ||||||||
Taproots | becoming stout, woody. |
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Stems | erect or ascending to prostrate, usually branched proximally; main stem 0.8–3 mm diam. proximally. |
usually ascending to erect, sometimes prostrate. |
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Leaves | stipules conspicuous, dull white to tan, narrowly triangular, 4.5–11 mm, apex long-acuminate; blade linear, (0.6–)1–5.5 cm, fleshy, apex apiculate to spine-tipped; axillary leaves 1–2+ per cluster. |
stipules 6–9 mm; blade 1.5–5.5 cm. |
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Pedicels | erect, divergent, or reflexed in fruit. |
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Flowers | sepals connate 0.5–1.8 mm proximally, lobes often 3-veined, ovate to lanceolate, 4.5–7 mm, to 8 mm in fruit, margins 0.3–0.7 mm wide, apex blunt to rounded; petals white or pink to rosy, elliptic to obovate, 0.9–1.3 times as long as sepals in flower; stamens 9–10; styles 0.6–3 mm. |
sepal lobes ± lanceolate, 4.5–5.5 mm, to 6.5 mm in fruit; petals white, 1–1.1 times as long as sepals; styles 1.2–1.9 mm. |
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Capsules | tan, 4.6–10 mm, 0.8–1.4 times as long as sepals. |
1.2–1.4 times as long as sepals. |
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Seeds | ± red-brown, often with submarginal groove or depression, suborbiculate to pyriform, compressed, (0.6–)0.7–1.2 mm, smooth to faintly or prominently tuberculate or sculpturing of parallel, wavy lines or of low, rounded mounds, not papillate; wing absent or white to reddish brown proximally, 0.1–0.3 mm wide, margins irregular. |
dark red-brown, not grooved, suborbiculate, 0.7–0.8 mm, smooth to faintly tuberculate (40x); wing absent or 0.1–0.3 mm wide. |
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Cymes | simple to 3-compound or flowers solitary and axillary. |
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Spergularia macrotheca |
Spergularia macrotheca var. leucantha |
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Phenology | Flowering spring. | |||||||||
Habitat | Alkaline soils, floodplains, vernal pools, meadows, marshy ground | |||||||||
Elevation | 0-800 m (0-2600 ft) | |||||||||
Distribution |
CA; OR; WA; BC; including nw Mexico
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CA |
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Discussion | Varieties 3 (3 in the flora). (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 5, p. 18. | FNA vol. 5, p. 18. | ||||||||
Parent taxa | Caryophyllaceae > subfam. Polycarpoideae > Spergularia | Caryophyllaceae > subfam. Polycarpoideae > Spergularia > Spergularia macrotheca | ||||||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||||||
Synonyms | Arenaria macrotheca | Tissa leucantha | ||||||||
Name authority | (Hornemann ex Chamisso & Schlechtendal) Heynhold: Alph. Aufz. Gew. 689. (1846) | (Greene) B. L. Robinson: Proc. Amer. Acad. Arts 29: 313. (1894) | ||||||||
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