UT, Colorado Plateau, 20060413
Cad's Crotch, flowers.
Upper end on east side up a little-used 4wd power-line access road that winds up through junipers. Washes still damp: must've had rain a few days ago; probably the same rain that filled up Buckskin Gulch over the weekend.
Castilleja chromosa
Particularly red herbage here; just starting to bloom.
Boraginaceae
| | GEN | | ann?, cesp, many sts and brs |
| | LF | | lin-ellip, 25x2.5mm, erect, strig, greyish, midv v raised bel, acute, sess |
| | SEP | | 5, free, 8x1mm, strig |
| | PET | | 5, salverform, lt yell, fragrant, tube 30x1-2mm| lobes | | 6x7mm, rounded, frilly |
corolla 22mm across, strig outside in stripes at base of and bel lobes |
| | STAM | | 5, att 4mm from top of tube |
| | OV | | deeply 4 lobed around style, tin, 1 ovule per chamb |
Family is clear (the 4-lobed ovary surrounding base of style is a dead give away), but I can't even key out the genus (in
JM for example) without a mature seed, and
Taylor doesn't suggest anything remotely resembling this plant.
Physaria acutifolia
| | LF | | basal and caul, spat, blade ellip to obov, flat to strongly cupped, 20-35x12-25+10-20mm, petiole 2-4mm wide (sorta clasps st), d sess peltate hairy |
| | INFL | | v d term rac, pedicel 10+mm |
| | SEP | | 4, free, erect, yell-green, pelt hairy, 7x1.5mm, lin, rounded-acute tip |
| | PET | | 4, free, yell, 9x2mm, strap, round tip, last 2-3mm spreading 90deg, glab |
| | STAM | | 4 short 2 long, all excl |
| | OV | | 1, sup, v d wh stell, v 2-lobed, comp perp septum, notched, 2 ovules per chamb |
Apparently fruit must eventually inflate significantly. Genus clear, but no reference available to key to species.
Astragalus amphioxys?
| | LF | | odd-pin, petiole 20mm| lflt | | 5+ pairs, 8x4.5+0.5mm, ellip, sl folded up, acutish |
wh dolab strig, internodes 5-6mm |
| | INFL | | d raceme, fls erect to spreading a bit, sev fls |
| | SEP | | 5, join, total 15x4-5mm, long inflation on top side, stiffish papery texture, strig wh or black-and-white, cuts 2-4mm (longest on top), lobes narr acum to lin |
| | PET | | 30mm long, purple to blue |
| | KEEL | | 17x7mm, 60deg, purple or blue w dker veins and broad white zone in middle w (or without) fine purple specks in white, 11-12mm, purple, white bel, interlocks w wings |
| | OV | | 1, long, strig, ellip, stalked, many seeds, all att ab (no septum), looks like it will be inflated later, purple speckles |
Genus clear, and
Taylor suggests this species, which looks entirely plausible, though it is not mentioned in any of my technical references. (Although, there is a
A. amphidoxus in
H&C, but it looks all wrong.)
< 20060411 | home | index | 20060414 >
