* FLAX FAMILY 397 



Styles 5; flowers blue, petals without ventral scales at base; stamens with 5 short alternating 

 staminodes (Sect. Eulinum). 



Annual ; stigmas elongated „ 1. X. usitatissimum. 



Perennial; stigmas nearly as broad as long 2. L. lewisii. 



Styles less than 5 ; stamens without alternating staminodes. 



Styles 2; petals without ventral scales; flowers yellow; upper leaves serrate (Sect. Catharto- 



linum) 3. L. digynum. 



Styles 3 ; petals commonly with a tooth on each side at base and a median scale or appendage ; 

 filaments more or less dilated at the united base (Sect. Hcsperolinon). 

 Leaves not glandular-margined. 



Pedicels short and flowers in rather close clusters. 



Flowers yellow 4. L. hreweri. 



Flowers white, pink or rose-purple. 



Stems shortly branched at top ; sepals pubescent 5. L. congestum. 



Stems paniculately branched; sepals glabrous 6. L. calif ornicum. 



Pedicels usually elongated and flowers mostly solitary ; stems much branched. 

 Flowers pinkish or white ; stems difi'usely paniculate above. 



Petals about 3 lines long; pedicels straight 7. L. spergulinum. 



Petals about 2 lines long; pedicels curved at apex.; 8. L. micranthum. 



Flowers yellow, the petals % to IV2 lines long; stems repeatedly dichotomous.... 



9. L. clevelandii. 

 Leaves closely margined with stipitate glands. 



Pedicels long, solitary; petals yellow; sepals merely acute 10. L. adenophyllum. 



Pedicels short, mostly clustered; petals rose-pink; sepals acuminate, cuspidate 



11. L. drymarioides. 



1. L. usitatissimum L. Common Flax. Linseed. Annual or biennial; stems 

 one or several from the base, 1 to 3 feet hij^li; herbage glabrous; leaf -blades lance- 

 olate to linear, acute or acuminate, i/4 to ly^ inches long; flowers 6 to 8 lines long, 

 on pedicels % to ly^ inches long; petals blue; stigmas elongated; capsule depressed- 

 globose, shortly acute, 2i/2 to Sy2 lines long; septa not ciliate. 



Native of Asia, locally introduced, sometimes established, sometimes fugitive; 

 mostly along the coast. June-July. 



Econ. note. — The wild ancestor of this, the cultivated flax, is not certainly kno'mi, but is 

 probably Asiatic. Archaeologists have uncovered flax mills in deposits 5000 years old in Baby- 

 lonia and in stone age deposits of Europe. In California cultivation of this species has been 

 sporadic — usually involving merely a half hundred or a few hundred acres sown as a seed crop, 

 never for fibre, at long and irregular intervals. 



Locs. — Eedlands (Bull. S. Cal. Acad. 19*:21); Los Angeles (Erythea 1:58); Moss Beach, 

 San Mateo Co., E. Brandegee; San Francisco (Zoe 2:344) ; West Berkeley, Pendleton 4" Heed; 

 Bear Eiver Eidge, Humboldt Co., Tracy 6279; Trinidad, Tracy 3236; Hupa Mt., Davy 5685. 



Eefs. — LiNUM USITATISSIMUM L. Sp. PI. 277 (1753), type European; Hegi, Fl. Mit.-Eur. 

 5^20, fig. 1676 (1925). 



2. L. lewisii Pursh. Western Blue Flax. Stems several from a woody root- 

 crown, erect, thickly clothed with leaves, simple below the corymbosely branched 

 summit; herbage glabrous; leaf -blades linear-lanceolate or linear, acute, 5 to 11 

 lines long ; flowers in terminal loose and somewhat corymbose clusters, or racemose 

 on the branches; sepals ovate, 3 to 5-nerved; corolla blue, 6 to 10 lines wide; pedicels 

 6 to 7 lines long, becoming elongated in fruit; sepals ovate, 3 to 5-nerved; capsule 

 globose, acute, 4 to 5 lines long, eventually dehiscent by 10 valves, the valves often 

 with a brown midnerve. 



Mountain slopes and valleys, 10 to 11,000 feet : mostly in the high montane 

 region, rare in the deserts and Coast Ranges, absent from the Great Valley. East 

 to Texas, north to British America. May- Aug. 



Locs. — Coast Eanges : summit betw. Marble Mt. and Woolly Creek, Butler 9 ; South Yollo 

 Bolly, Jepson 13,537; West Berkeley, Jepson 13,538; New Idria, San Carlos Kange, Jepson; 

 Atascadero, Brewer 502. Sierra Nevada : lava beds, Modoc Co., M. S. BaJcer; Lassen Peak, J. Grin- 

 nell; Warner Creek, Plumas Co., Jepson 12,282 ; Fales Hot Sprs., Mono Co., Ottley 1112 ; Kennedy 

 Lake, Tuolumne Co., A. L. Grant 284; Bloody Canon, Mono Co., Chesnut 4- Drew; Alta Mdws., 

 Tulare Co., Newlon 41. Desert ranges: White Mts., ShocMey 469; Barnwell, New York Mts., 



