Cuscuta. CONVOLVULACE^E. 535 



3. CUSCUTA, Toura. DODDER. 



(By Dr. GEORGE ENGELMANN.) 



Calyx 5- (sometimes 4-) cleft or parted. Corolla campanulate or short-tubular, 

 the spreading liuib 5 - 4-parted, between convolute and imbricated in the bud, not 

 plaited. Stamens mostly furnished with a scale-like fringed appendage below their 

 insertion in the throat. Ovary globose, 2-celled, 4-ovuled. Styles in all our species 

 2, distinct. Capsule 1 - 4-seeded, circumscissile (bursting transversely), or mostly 

 baccate. Embryo filiform, spirally coiled in the (when dry) hard-fleshy albumen, 

 destitute of cotyledons, sometimes furnished at the upper part with a few alter- 

 nate scales (belonging to the plumule), germinating in the soil, but not rooting 

 in it, developing into filiform and branching annual stems of a yellowish or reddish 

 hue, which become parasitic on the bark of herbs or small shrubs, being attached 

 by means of suckers at the whole surface of contact (the base soon dying away), 

 twining extensively, bearing occasional small scales in the place of leaves. Flowers 

 small, cymose or densely clustered, white or whitish, usually produced late in the 

 season. Engelm. in Amer. Jour. Sci. 1842, & Trans. St. Louis Acad. Sci. (1859) 

 i. 453. 



A widely distributed genus of nearly 80 species, divided into three subgene.ra ; the first, Eucus- 

 cuta (with distinct styles and elongated stigmas, and circumscissile capsule), indigenous exclu- 

 sively to the Old World, although the injurious Flax- Dodder has been introduced with flax-seed 

 into the New ; the second and largest, Grammica (with distinct styles and capitate stigmas), 

 belonging principally to the New ; the third and smallest, Monogyna (with styles united into 

 one), scattered over the whole globe. The Californian species are all of the section Clistogram- 

 mica, having capitate stigmas and a baccate or indehisceiit capsule. The following species, 

 natives of Arizona or Utah, are not unlikely to reach California : 



C. TENUIFLOKA, Engelm. and C. OBTUSIFLORA, HBK., both with closed or baccate capsule: 

 C. APPLANATA, Engelm., C. ODONTOLEPIS, Engelm., and C. UMBELLATA, HBK., with capsule 

 opf uing regularly round the base. 



* Capsule depressed-globose. 



1. C. arvensis, Beyrich. Stems capillary : flowers small (about a line long), 

 in small umbel-like cymes, pedicellate : tube of the broad-carnpanulate corolla 

 included in the broadly lobed calyx, as long as or rather shorter than its ovate- 

 lanceolate inflexed-pointed lobes: scales large, broadly oval, deeply fringed: styles 

 shorter than the large depressed ovary : capsule depressed-globose, girt at the 

 base by the persistent corolla : seeds 4. Engelm. in Gray, Man. ed. 2, 336, 

 & ed. 5, 378. 



Long Valley, Mendocino Co., Kellogg. Not rare from the Middle Atlantic States to Texas, 

 but thus far found only once in California. 



2. C. Californica, Choisy, and Hook. & Arn. Stems capillary ; flowers small 

 or middle-sized, pedicelled in loose few-flowered cymes : lobes of the calyx acute : 

 lobes of the corolla lanceolate-subulate, as long as or longer than the shallow cam- 

 panulate tube : filaments mostly as long as the linear-oblong anthers : scales none, 

 or sometimes indicated by rudimentary inverted arches near the base of the tube : 

 ovary small, mostly depressed, with slender styles ; capsule depressed. DC. Prodr. 

 ix. 457. The extreme forms are : 



Var. breviflora, Engelm. Flowers scarcely more than a line long : calyx-lobes 

 acuminate, equalling or surpassing the tube of the corolla : filaments and anthers 

 short : styles as long as the ovary : corolla withering at base of or around the 2-4- 

 seeded capsule. Engelm. in Trans. St. Louis Acad. Sci. 1. c. 499. 



Var. longiloba, Engelm. 1. c. Flowers longer-pedicelled, 1J to 2| lines long: 

 calyx-lobes short, or sometimes long and acuminate and even recurved at tip : lobes 



