MACLOSKIE: EPHEDRACE^E. 145 



short style. Female catkins i -several, subsessile, 2-flowered. Involucres 

 4-6, deeply bifid, the uppermost equalling the oval pistils. 

 N. Patagon. and by the Andes to Quito. 



2. E. TWEED i ANA Fisch. & Mey. 



Subscandent shrub. Sheaths short, deeply bifid laciniate. Male catkins 

 aggregate at the joints, sessile ; anthers 4-5, scarcely stipitate. Female 

 catkins solitary or aggregate, sessile or nearly so, 2-flowered ; the upper 

 involucre bifid to the middle, as long as the ovate-oblong pistil. 



N. Patagon. and Argentina. 



(2) Dioecious. 



3. E. FRUSTILLATA MierS. 



A stunted shrub 10 cm. high with creeping caudex and reddish-brown 

 sulcate branches. Internodes only 12 mm. long, with whorled branches 

 at the nodes ; 2 sheathing leaf-scales round each node. Male and female 

 plants similar ; flowers on the ultimate branchlets. Male catkin solitary, 

 terminal with 4-6 pairs of decussating imbricating bracts. Anthers 5, glo- 

 bose, sessile on the exserted staminal column. Female plant crowded 

 with larger dark-brown flowers, 4 at each node on short peduncles. 



Chubut; S. Patagon. (Rio Sta. Cruz, J. B. Hatcher, Dec. 28, 1896.) 



4. E. OCHREATA Miers. 



Shrub with virgate branches and stout striatellate branchlets ; inter- 

 nodes 5 cm. long with 3-4 leaf-scales 8 cm. long, united into a sheath 

 ending in long excurrent points. Male catkins sessile, 4 at each node, 

 enclosed by the sheath ; containing each 25-30 flowers. Female catkins 

 short-peduncled, 2-4 at each node with 5-seriate involucre of decreasing 

 pairs. Fruit as 2 terminal achenes, turning downwards, with the apical 

 micropyle scarcely exserted. 



S. and N. Patagon. and Argentina. 



5- E. PATAGONICA Phil. 



Very branching. Internodes only 9 mm. long, striate, sulcate and 

 smooth. Sheaths little cleft, the uppermost divided into broad-ovate 

 lobes. Male catkins usually solitary on the peduncles. Anthers 3-4, 

 rarely 5 ; staminal column scarcely exceeding the involucre. Female 

 catkins solitary, 4-flowered ; scales of involucre ovate, narrowly margined. 



S. Patagon. ; Lake Pinto. 



(Possibly the same as E. fmstillata.} 



