1. Allenrolfea occidentalis (Wats.) O. Ktze. Pickle-weed, iodine bush. Fig. 420. 



Perennial suffrutescent succulent glabrous shrub 3-15 dm. tall; stems alter- 

 nate, green or more or less glaucous, much-branched, the articulate branches 

 ascending or spreading, the younger ones 1-3 mm. in diameter, the joints 2-10 

 mm. long; leaves alternate, very short, reduced to scales, triangular, clasping, 

 acute or acutish, soon deciduous or often nearly obsolete; spikes very numerous, 

 6-25 mm. long, 2.5-4 mm. thick, obtuse; flowers perfect, sessile with fleshy 

 peltate bracts in dense cylindrical spikes; perianth much-reduced, obpyramidal, 

 fleshy, angled, usually 4- or 5-lobed, unchanged in the fruit which it encloses; 

 stamens 1 or 2. the filaments exserted, the anthers broadly oblong or orbicular; 

 stigmas 2 or 3, short, usually distinct; utricles ovoid, compressed, enclosed in 

 the spongy fruiting perianth; pericarp membranaceous and free; seed erect, oblong, 

 smooth, brown or reddish-brown, about 0.6 mm. long; embryo partly enclosing 

 the copious endosperm; radicle inferior. 



In strongly alkaline places such as floodplains and in marshes among shrubs, 

 in w. Tex., N.M. (rather general) and Ariz, (throughout state). Mar .-Sept.; Ore. 

 to w. Tex., Baja Calif, and Son. 



3. Salsola L. 



About 150 species cosmopolitan in distribution; mostly maritime or in saline 

 soils. 



1. Salsola Kali L. Russian thistle, tumbleweed. 



Annual herb, much-branched from the base, becoming hemispherical; stems 3-8 

 dm. tall, glabrous to pubescent or short-villous, conspicuously green and purple- 

 striped, often tinged with red, the very stout branches ascending or spreading 

 and glabrous to scabrous or short-villous; leaves usually alternate, linear to fili- 

 form, almost terete, sessile or clasping, pungent-tipped, usually 1.2-3 cm. long 

 and thick but occasionally to 7 cm. long and more fleshy or succulent, often 

 bluish-green, scabrous or glabrous, 1.5-2 mm. wide, the upper leaves often 

 shorter and broader, their bases much-thickened and indurate in age and closely 

 enclosing the fruit; bracteal leaves usually 5-8 mm. long; flowers perfect, sessile, 

 small, subtended by two bractlets in addition to the leaf, solitary in the axils or 

 sometimes several together; perianth 5-parted, the segments oblong or lanceolate, 

 concave, becoming strongly transversely carinate and horizontally winged in the 

 fruit, the basal portions free or connate, the apices free and usually inflexed; 

 fruiting perianth 3-10 mm. wide when well-developed, those of the lowest flowers 

 often merely carinate across the back, the segments sharp-pointed; wings of the 

 perianth segments persistent, membranaceous, whitish or pinkish, making the first 

 3-8 mm. in diameter; stamens 5 or fewer, hypogynous or rarely inserted in a 

 small disk, the filaments subulate or linear, the anthers short or elongate; stigmas 

 2 or rarely 3, subulate; ovule subsessile or suspended from a long funicle; utricle 

 flattened, broadly ovoid or orbicular, the apex concave or convex, included in 

 the perianth; pericarp fleshy or membranaceous, free from the seed; seed hori- 

 zontal, rarely inverted, erect or oblique, orbicular, 1.5-3 mm. broad, black, shin- 

 ing; endosperm none; embryo spiral or cochleate-spiral, usually green. Incl. var. 

 tenuifolia Mey., 5. pestifer A. Nels. 



Dry plains and valleys, in mud about drying ponds in salt marshes, alkaline 

 floodplains, common along roadsides and in cult, fields, Euras.; perhaps nat. along 

 the e. seacoast and rarely adv. inland; thoroughly naturalized in w. N.A. from 

 Minn, and Sask. to Wash., Calif, and Tex.; July-Oct. 



Kearney and Peebles has the following to say about this plant: "In early 

 spring the young plants are readily eaten by livestock, and the dead plants are 



839 



