Ranunculus. RANUNCULACE.E. 35 



Var.* Blankinshipii, Robinson, n. var. Silky-lauate indumentum persisting but 

 less dense than in the type : akenes conspicuously hisi^id-papillose. — Capay, Yolo County, 

 Calif., J. W. Blankinship, 15 April, 1893. 



3. Short-stifled ; the introrsely stigmatic styles thickish-subulate and mostly all persisting in 

 the short and straight or recurved beak : herbage hirsute or pubescent. 



O Lax or weak-stemmed, Califoruian, no stolons : petals more than 5 : beak of akenes sub- 

 ulate and more or less hooked. 

 R. CalifornicUS, Benth. Usually pubescent or hirsute, 6 to 25 inches high, branching 

 and naked above: petals 6 to 15 (sometimes only 5?), deep glossy yellow, or becoming 

 paler, oblong or narrowly obovate, a third to half inch long : akenes fiat but only slightly 

 margined, 2 lines or less long, and beak about half line long. — PI. Hartw. 295 ; Brew. & 

 Wats. Bot. Calif, i. 7 (excl. var. canus) ; Gray, 1. c. 373. R. dissectus, Hook. & Am. Bot. 

 Beech. 316, not Bieb. R. acris, var. (Deppii, Nutt.) Torr. & Gray, Fl. i. 21. R. deljihini- 

 Jblius? Torr. & Gray, 1 c. 659, not HBK.^ — Dry or barely moist ground, common through- 

 out all the western part of California and adjacent Oregon; early coll. by DoikjIxis and 

 by Th. Coulter. The typical form with leaves some ternately divided or parted and some 

 pinnately 5-divided into linear or narrow lanceolate and often 2-3-parted divisions, passes 

 freely into 



Var. latilobus, Gray. Radical leaves palmately 3-parted or divided into broadly or 

 narrowly cuneate incisely cleft or laciniate divisions, and cauline leaves correspondinglv 

 coarse. — Proc. Am. Acnd. xxi. 375. R. Ludovicianus, Greene, Bull. Calif. Acad. Sci. ii. 58. — 

 A common form, especially southward, from San Francisco Bay to San Diego and San Ber- 

 nardino. Some forms too nearly approach R. canus.^ 



O O Strictly erect species, introduced from Europe, no stolons : very short styles stigmatose 



for all or most of their length : petals 5, broad, a third to half inch long. See also R. 



parvnius. 



R. Acris, L. Tall, not bulbous-thickened at base of stem, summer-flowering: leaves of 



rounded outline, pedately 5-parted or almost divided ; but divisions not petiolulate, 2-3-cleft 



and laciniate, lobes and teeth acute : calyx merely spreading : petals smaller and less glos.sy 



than in the next : short style more prominent. — Spec. i. 554 ; Curt. Fl. Lond. i. t. 39 ; Fl. 



Dan. t. 2415; Torr. & Gray, Fl. i. 21, excl. var. — Moist ground, Atlantic States and 



Canada, especially eastward (Nat. from Eu.) : Newfoundland, &c., where,^ as in Greenland, 



perhaps indigenous. 



R. nuLBOsus, L. A foot or two high from a globose solid-bulbous base or corm, spring- 

 flowering : radical leaves of ovate outline, divided into 3 roundish leaflets, of which the 

 middle one is conspicuously and the lateral slightly if at all petiolulate, and all 3-cleft or 

 parted and inci.sed, lobes and teeth mostly obtuse : petals ol)ovate-orbicular, deep glossy 

 yellow: calyx reflexed : style very short. — Spec. i. 554; Fl. Dan. t. 551 ; Schkuhr, Handb. 

 t. 152; Bigel. Med. Bot. iii. 61, t. 47. — Meadows and pastures, Canada to Virginia, and 

 even Louisiana, but most common in New England.* (Nat from P]u.) 



O O Erect or ascending, not stoloniferous, 5-petalous : straight and stout-subulate style 

 stigmatose for a good part of its length, and persisting in a broad-subulate beak. 



R. Pennsylvanicus, L. f. Erect from an (at least sometimes) animal root, hirsute with 

 widely spreading almost hispid hairs : stem stout, a foot or two high, leafy to the top: leaves 

 all ternately compound and petiolulate leaflets 3-parted or deeply cleft into oblong or 

 cuneate-lanceolate and laciniate segments and lobes, these acute : peduncles short : petals 

 oblong or obovate and small, a line or two long, not surpassing the reflexed calyx : akenes a 

 line long, pointed with a nearly straight short beak, becoming spicate in the oblong or 



1 Add syn. 1 R. rugulosus, Greene, Pittonia, ii. 58. 



2 A number of further varieties of tlie polymorphous R. Californicus have been characterized by 

 Prof. Greene, Fl. Francis. 299, & Erytliea, i. 125; the material at hand, however, fails to show the.se 

 forms well marked among frequent intermediates. 



3 There is little in its mode of occurrence in Newfoundland to suggest indigenous nature, since it 

 appears there as elsewhere in America along roadsides, about habitations, and in pastures. 



4 Sparingly introduced also in the far west, S. Brit. Columbia, Macoun. 



