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little butter 'n' eggs, purple-beak owl's-clover

Stems

simple or with 1–4 ascending branches proximally, (3.5–)5–15(–19) cm, glabrous proximally, pubescent to glandular-pubescent distally.

Leaves

pubescent to glandular-pubescent;

proximal cauline: blade filiform to linear, (4–)5–25 mm;

cauline: blade ± elliptic to obovate, 10–25 mm, base sessile, margins usually pinnatifid, lateral lobes 2–6(or 7).

Pedicels

0.5–0.8 mm, glabrous, rarely sparsely puberulent.

Flowers

calyx 6–7 mm, pubescent to glandular-pubescent, tube (2–)3–5 mm, lobes narrowly lanceolate, 1–3 × 0.8–1.3 mm;

corolla yellow, rarely yellow and white, 10–12 mm, hairy, beak dark purple, rarely yellow, not hooked, abaxial lobes spreading, 1.5–2 mm, throat abruptly indented, forming a fold under abaxial corolla lip, adaxial lobes projecting;

stamens included, pollen sac yellow, 1–1.3 mm, glabrous, dehiscing longitudinally;

style 6–9 mm, glabrous;

stigma 2-lobed.

Capsules

3–5.5 × 3–4 mm, glabrous.

Seeds

(30–)40–80, ovoid to ellipsoid, 0.8–1 mm.

Spikelike

racemes interrupted, open distally, 0.5–11 cm;

peduncle absent;

bracts pinnatifid, ± obovate, 7–13(–15) mm, lateral lobes 2–4.

2n

= 22.

Triphysaria micrantha

Phenology Flowering Mar–Apr.
Habitat Grasslands, gravelly hilltops, oak woodlands.
Elevation 50–800 m. (200–2600 ft.)
Distribution
from FNA
CA
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Triphysaria micrantha is known from central California from the coast to the Sierra Nevada.

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

Source FNA vol. 17, p. 686.
Parent taxa Orobanchaceae > Triphysaria
Sibling taxa
T. eriantha, T. floribunda, T. pusilla, T. versicolor
Synonyms Orthocarpus micranthus, O. erianthus var. micranthus
Name authority (Greene ex A. Heller) T. I. Chuang & Heckard: Syst. Bot. 16: 660. (1991)
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