RANUNCULACEAE (BUTTERCUP FAMILY) 195 



6. ACONITUM L. ACONITE. MONKSHOOD 



Perennial herbs, with palmately lobed or dissected leaves, and showy 

 flowers in terminal racemes or panicles. Sepals 5, petal-like; the upper one 

 large, helmet-shaped or prolonged saccate. Petals 2-5; the upper two with 

 long nectariferous claws and irregular spur-like blades concealed within the 

 hood; the 3 lower very minute or obsolete. Follicles 3-5, with several to 

 many squamellose seeds. 



Primary leaf-segments rarely cleft below the middle. 

 Flowers blue, sometimes very pale. 



Raceme open or paniculate, few-flowered . . . . .1. A. columbianum. 



Raceme dense, subspicate 2. A. Bakeri. 



Flowers ochroleucous . . . . . . . . . 3. A. lutescens. 



Primary leaf-segments cleft nearly to the base . . . . . 4. A. ramosum. 



1. Aconitum columbianum Nutt. T. & G. Fl. N. A. 1: 34. 1838. More or 

 less pubescent above with short spreading viscid hairs: stem stout, 9-18 dm. 

 high: divisions of the leaves broadly cuneate, laciniately toothed, lobed, or 

 cleft to near the middle: flowers blue, sometimes pale or nearly white, some- 

 what pubescent, rather few, in a loose terminal panicle-like raceme: hood 

 12-15 mm. long, the helmet-shaped portion higher than broad; the beak vari- 

 able, porrect or downwardly curved. (^4. insigne Greene, in herb.) Moist 

 open woods; from New Mexico to British Columbia. 



2. Aconitum Bakeri Greene, PL Baker. 3: 5. 1901. The whole upper por- 

 tion of the plant, even the flowers, short-hirsute with glandular hairs, or some- 

 what viscid-villous: root semifleshy, short, fusiform: stem stoutish, erect, 

 simple and rather strict, 5-7 dm. high: leaves mostly 5-parted, the cuneate 

 divisions doubly about 3-cleft to near the middle: raceme compact or sub- 

 spicate, the flowers usually dark blue: hood 15-18 mm. long, scarcely higher 

 than broad; beak subulate, usually projecting horizontally: follicles glabrous, 

 about 4. (,1. atrocyancum Rydb. Bull. Torr. Bot. Club 29: 150. 1902; A. 

 porrectum Rydb. 1. c.) Moist subalpine stations; Colorado mountains. 



3. Aconitum lutescens A. Nels. Bot. Gaz. 42: 51. 1906. Root small, 

 fusiform-tuberous: stems slender, simple, erect, only 3-6 dm. high, glabrous 

 nearly to the inflorescence: leaves 3-5 cm. broad; the 5 broadly cuneate divi- 

 sions deeply and incisely toothed above the middle: raceme narrow, long for 

 the plant, rather open; the flowers a pure cream-color, becoming nearly white 

 or pinkish in drying; rachis and pedicels softly hirsute-ciliate with straight 

 viscid hairs standing out at right angles. Wyoming, Colorado, and New 

 Mexico. 



4. Aconitum ramosum A. Nels. Bull. Torr. Bot. Club 26: 8. 1899. Pu- 

 bescent above only, obscurely glandular: stems 3-5 dm. high, more or less 

 branched above: leaves 3-4-parted; the segments 2- or 3-cleft much below 

 the middle; these divisions also incised, the leaf thus appearing incisely mul- 

 tifid with linear-lanceolate lobes: flowers in short terminal, capitate racemes, 

 blue: hood 12-16 mm. long; the beak short: follicles cylindrical-oblong, 

 reticulately veined, nearly glabrous. As yet only from northeastern Wyom- 

 ing. 



7. AHEMONE L. ANEMONE. WINDFLOWER 



Erect perennial herbs. Basal leaves lobed, divided, or dissected, and those 

 of the stem forming an involucre either near to or distant from the solitary 

 or umbellate flowers. Sepals 4-20. Petals wanting. Stamens numerous, 

 shorter than the sepals. Pistils numerous, becoming compressed achenes, 

 which are not long-tailed. 



Achenes densely woolly. 



Stem low, simple, 1-flowered. 



From slender rootstocks . . . . . . . . 1. A. parviflora. 



From a short erect caudex 2. A. lithophila. 



Stems generally branching above, 1-3 dm. high; flowers mostly 



more than 1. 

 Head of carpels globose . . . . . . . . 3. A. globosa. 



Head of carpels cylindrical . . . . . . . . 4. A. cylindrica. 



