Genus 6. 



GOOSEFOOT FAMILY. 



17 



6. MONOLEPIS Schrad. Ind. Sem. Gott. 4. 1830. 



Low annual branching herbs, with small narrow alternate entire toothed or lobed leaves, 

 and polygamous or perfect flowers in small axillary clusters. Calyx of a single persistent 

 herbaceous sepal. Stamen i. Styles 2, slender. Utricle flat, the pericarp adherent to the 

 smooth vertical seed. Embryo a very nearly complete ring in the mealy endosperm, its 

 radicle turned downward. [Greek, single-scale, from the solitary sepal.] 



About 5 species, natives of western North America and northern Asia. Type species: Mono- 

 lepis trifida Schrad. 



I. Monolepis Nuttalliana (R. & S.) Greene. 



Blitum chenopodioides Nutt. Gen. i : 4. 181S. Not 



Lam. 1783. 

 Blitum Nuttalliamtm R. & S. Mant. i : 65. 1822. 

 Monolepis chenopodioides Moq. in DC. Prodr. 13=: 85. 



1849. 

 Monolepis Nuttalliana Greene, Fl. Fran. 168. 1891. 



Slightly mealy when young, pale green, glabrous 

 or nearly so when old; stem 3'-i2' high; branches 

 many, ascending. Leaves lanceolate in outline, 

 short-petioled, or the upper sessile, i'-2F long, 

 narrowed at the base, 3-lobed, the middle lobe lin- 

 ear or linear-oblong, acute or acuminate, 2-4 times 

 as long as the ascending lateral ones ; flowers clus- 

 tered in the axils; sepal oblanceolate or spatulate, 

 acute or subacute; pericarp minutely pitted, about 

 i" broad; margins of the seed acute. 



In alkaline or dry soil, Manitoba and the Northwest 

 Territory to Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico 

 and southern California. June-Sept. 



IMonolepis. Fig. 1696. 



7. ATRIPLEX [Tourn.] L. Sp. PI. 1052. 1753. 



Annual or perennial herbs or low shrubs, often scurfy-canescent or silvery. Leaves 

 alternate, petioled or sessile, or soime of them opposite. Flowers dioecious or monoecious, 

 small, green, in panicled spikes or capitate-clustered in the axils. Staminate flowers bract- 

 less, consisting of a 3-5-parted calyx and an equal number of stamens ; filaments separate 

 or united by their bases ; a rudimentary ovary sometimes present. Pistillate flowers silb- 

 tended by 2 bractlets which enlarge in fruit and are more or less united, sometimes quite 

 to their summits, their margins entire or toothed, their sides smooth, crested, tubercled 

 or winged; perianth none; ovary globose or ovoid; stigmas 2. Utricle completely or par- 

 tially enclosed by the fruiting bractlets. Seed vertical or rarely horizontal ; embryo annular, 

 the radicle pointing upward or downward; endosperm mealy. [From a Greek name of 

 orache.] 



About 130 species, of very wide geographic distribution. Besides the following, some 50 others 

 occur in the western parts of North America. Type species ; Atriplex hortensis L. 

 Annual herbs ; stems or branches erect, diffuse or ascending. 



Leaves hastate, ovate to rhombic-lanceolate or linear-lanceolate. 



Plant green, glabrous or sparingly scurfy, not silvery ; leaves slender-petloled. 



I. A. hastata. 

 Plant very scurfy ; leaves rhombic-ovate, short-petioled. 2. A, rosea. 



Plant densely silvery ; leaves hastate, entire or little toothed. 3. A. argentea. 



Leaves oblong, densely silvery, entire ; plant of sea beaches. 4, A. arenaria. 



Perennial herbs or shrubs ; leaves oblong or oblanceolate, entire ; plants of the western plains. 



Fruiting bractlets suborbicular, wingless, their sides crested or tubercled. 5. A.Nuttallii. 



Fruiting bractlets appendaged by 4 vertical reticulated wings. 6. A. canescens. 



