4.')4 NYCTAGINACEAE 



Fruits narrowly winged or wingless. 



Wings 5, narrow, sometimes ridge-like 7. A. turbinata. 



Wings or ridges 2 or none S. A. exalata. 



S. Acaulescent or nearly so; high montane. 



Prostrate, forming thick mats; clusters 2 or ."-flowered 9. A. alpina. 



Erect, scapose; clusters about 15-flowered 10. A. nana. 



1. A, latifolia Esch. Yellow Sand-Verbexa. Steins stout. 1 to 2 feet 

 long, prostrate, only the leaves and flowering peduncles aseending or erect; 

 herbage very succulent, glandular-puberulent ; leaves orbicular and broader 

 than long to broadly ovate, truncate or reniform at base, yu to lio inches 

 long ; peduncles usually exceeding the leaves ; bracts 5, broadly ovate, acute, 

 2 to 3 lines long ; flowers somewhat fragrant, yellow, 6 lines long ; fruit broadly 

 turbinate, 4 to 7 lines long, its 5 wings more or less unequal, broadened from 

 the base upward, then sloping abruptly to the short beak or truncate, or the 

 wing.s sometimes much reduced; taproots cylindric, fleshy, i/. to 2 inches 

 thick, 1 to li/o feet long, often (when large) with rope-like branches several 

 feet long. 



Common along the seashore from Santa Barbara Co. to ilonterey and 

 northward to Vancouver Island. ]\Iay-Nov, 



Ref. — Abronia l.\tifolia Esch. Mem, Acad. Petersb. 10: 281 (1826), type from California 

 (Linnaca, .3; lift. ber. 147). 



2. A. maritima Nutt. Stems prostrate. 1 to 2 feet long ; herbage glandular- 

 puberulent : leaves thick, round-ovate, with regular flowing outline, Vi: to 

 1% inches long; flowers deep dark red; bracts thii-k, long oblong, acute, A 

 to 5 lines long; fruit large (5 to 7 lines long, 6 to 10 lines broad), its 5 

 wings strongly broadened upward, often somewhat produced above the body 

 and equaling or exceeding the short beak, or sometimes one or more much 

 reduced. 



Seashore, San Luis Obispo Co. to San Diego. Lower California, ilexico. 



Locs. — Avila, San Luis Obispo Bay, Summers; San (^'lemente Isl., T. Brandegee ; Del Mar, 

 T. Brandei/ce ; San Diego, Jep.^on 1.596; Coronado, Berg. The large globose clusters of fruit 

 suggest vaguely the head of Medusa. The variations in fruit and pubescence would, to a 

 certain degree, afford basis for segregation of forms similar to those of A. umbellata. 



Ref. — Abronia maritima Nutt.; Wats, Bot. Cal. 2: 4 (1880), type loc. San Pedro, Nuttull 

 (ex. label of type in Gray Herb.). 



3. A. umbellata Lam, Common Sand-Verbena. Stems slender, prostrate, 

 viscid, 1 to 3 feet long; leaves nearly glabrous, roundish or ovate to narrowly 

 oblong, the margin often somewhat sinuate, 1 to li/s inches long; heads 10 to 

 15-flowered, on peduncles 2 to 6 inches long; involucral bracts narrowly 

 lanceolate, 2 or 3 lines long; calyx rose-purple, 6 to 8 lines long; fruit 4 

 to 5 lines long, often as broad ; wings mostly 5, rather thin but firm, widened 

 upward and broadest above, at apex truncate or sloping to the beak, usually 

 shorter than the beak, or the wings sometimes reduced and the fruit narrow 

 and spindle-like. 



Common, Californian seacoast from Los Angeles Co. to ]\lonterey, San 

 Francisco Bay, Humboldt Co. and north to Washington. 



Refs. — Abronia umbellata Lam. Tab. Encycl. 1: 469, pi, 105 (1791), the type spm, cult, 

 at Paris from seed coll. at Monterey by Collignon of the La Perouse Exped. (Jussieu, Gen. 

 449); Jepson, Erythea, 1: 189 (1893). Lamarck's illustration shows a cluster of somewhat 

 spindle-shaped 5-winged fruits. This is the earliest described new species from California. 

 A. in.sularis Stand. C'ontrib. U. S. Nat. Herb. 12: 311, pi. 28 (1909), type loc. San Clemente 

 Island, Trask; differs from A. umbellata in its glabrous stems, elongated internodes and thick 

 coriaceous fruit wings, ex. char. ; not seen by us. 



Plants are sometimes found with very narrowly winged or ridged fruits, the wing broadest 

 near the middle and tapering to both base and apex (Seaside, Monterey Co., 7i. Brandegee), or 

 again with small flowers about 5 lines long (Eureka, Traeij 2.5.30). Plants enjoying both the 

 above characters answer to A. hrevifiora Stand. Contrib. U. S, Nat. Herb. 12: 312, pi. 30 



