420 



LABIATAE 



Loes. — Mitchell Caverns, Jepson 18,172; Gilroy Canon, Jepson 18,254; Bonanza King Canon, 

 Mary Beal 61S. 



Refg.—HEDEOMA NANA Briq. ; Engler & PrantI, Kat. Pflzfam. 43»:294 (1896). H. dentata 

 Torr. var. nana Torr., Bot. Mex. Bound. 130 (1859), type loc. rocky hills of the Eio Grande in e. 

 N. Mex., near El Paso, Tex. H. thymoides Gray, Syn. Fl. 2:362 (1886), not H. thymoides Pers. 

 (1807). 



14. SPHACELE Benth. 



Shrubs or merely siiffiruteseent plants. Flowers solitary in the axils of the re- 

 duced upper leaves, thus forming a leafy raceme. Calyx campanulate, deeply and 

 nearly equally 5-toothed, about 10 to 15-nerved, reticulate-veiny, conspicuously in- 

 flated and membranous after flowering. Corolla large and rather showy, with 4 



short spreading lobes, the fifth and lowest 

 lobe much longer and erect ; throat long and 

 ample, the proper tube short and somewhat 

 narrower, aud with a hairy ring within at 

 summit. Stamens 4, somewhat ascending; 

 filaments naked ; anthers somewhat approxi- 

 mate, tlie cells diverging. — Species 20, North 

 and South Amei'ica, one in Hawaiian Islands. 

 (Sphakos, the name of the Greeks for sage, 

 the plants of this genus having similar fo- 

 liage.) 



1. S. calycina Benth. Pitcher Sage. 

 (Fig. 435.) Erect, 1 to 3 (or 5) feet high ; 

 herbage pubescent or even somewhat woolly ; 

 leaf-blades broadly ovate to oblong-ovate, 

 obtuse, dentate or serrate, very veiny be- 

 neath, the base entire and varying from cord- 

 ate to acute, 2 to 4 inches long, the lower on 

 petioles 2 to 8 lines long, the uppermost ses- 

 sile; calyx in anthesis rather broad at base, 

 its lobes triangular-lanceolate; corolla white 

 or pink-tintecl, % to IVs inches long; calyx 

 in fruit ovoid-inflated, % to 1% inches long, the tips of the lobes incurving; nutlets 

 black, finely pubescent but smooth, broadly elliptical in outline, nearly 2 lines long. 

 Open chaparral ridges, hillslopes and canons, 10 to 3000 feet : Ventura Co. ; 

 Santa Barbara Co. ; Coast Ranges from San Luis Obispo Co. to Marin and Lake 

 Cos.; Sierra Nevada from Mariposa Co. to Butte Co. May- June. 



Geog. note. — Sphacele calycina is found in Ventura Co. and Santa Barbara Co. and throughout 

 the South Coast Ranges from San Luis Obispo Co. to Contra Costa Co. It inhabits the coast 

 line near Monterey, where it grows only a few hundred yards back of the beaches, and extends east 

 into the dry inner South Coast Range, though probably it is not found on the east slope of that 

 range. As in the case of a number of South Coast Range species it recurs in the foothills and 

 ranges surrounding the Sacramento Valley. It has not been reported in the inner North Coast 

 Range north of the Vaca Mountains, but will doubtless be found in that as yet little explored 

 region. The nutlets are nearly spherical, black and shining, and covered ^vith very short spread- 

 ing straight white hairs. In the field these hairs are scarcely visible on the direct side of the fruit, 

 but appear like a dew on the sides of the subglobose body. The shrubs, after chaparral fires or 

 artificial clearings, sprout from the root-crown. 



Pubescence varies. The stems are puberulent, the leaves in varying degrees puberulent or 

 hirsutulose, or sometimes whitish-tomentulose below. Degree of pubescence has no geographic or 

 observable ecologic significance. Bushes with greenish leaves and bushes vnth leaves tomentulose 

 beneath grow in similar situations, for example, on Mt. Tamalpais. Amount of woolliness is some- 

 times correlated with age. A state with very thin pubescence is var. glabella Gray. There is no 

 constant correlation of degrees of pubescence with leaf shape in what is here described as Sphacele 

 calycina. 



Locs. — Ventura Co.: Matilija Canon (w. fork). Ball 7841. Santa Barbara Co.: San Marcos 

 Pass, Santa Inez Mts., Jepson 12,139. Coast Ranges : La Panza, San Luis Obispo Co., Keel; 2819 ; 



Fig. 435. Sphacele caltcina Benth. 

 a, fl. branchlet, X % ; 6, nutlet, X 4. 



