IMPORTANT WESTERN BROWSE PLANTS 145 
it is often closely browsed by both sheep and cattle especially in the 
spring. Although common and fairly abundant it usually occurs 
in rather scattered stand. 
Wright anisacanth (A. wrightii, syn. Drejera wrightii) and 
dwarf anisacanth (A. insignis, syn. A. pumilus S. Wats., not Nees), 
two relatively broad-leaved species of this genus, occur in western 
Texas, the latter extending into extreme southern Arizona and 
Chihuahua. While palatable to livestock these are not so valuable 
as 1s A. thurberi. 
BELOPERONE SPP. 
This tropical American genus is represented in the United States 
solely by Beloperone californica, a rather low shrub of southern Cali- 
fornia and Lower California occurring mainly about desert springs 
and seeps, and having spreading branches which usually become 
practically leafless during the dry seasons. Its palatability is fairly 
good or good, but it is too limited in abundance and distribution to 
have more than purely local browse importance. The scarlet, honey- 
sucklelike flowers make it highly ornamental when in full bloom. 
CARLOWRIGHTIA SPP. 
This is a Southwestern genus of two almost semiherbaceous under- 
shrubs occurring in dry foothills, plains, and canyons. Heath car- 
lowrightia (C. linearifolia) is a smooth heathlike plant, 10 to 36 
inches high, with very narrow leaves; it occurs from western Texas 
to southern Arizona and south into Mexico and is almost worthless 
as forage. Carlowrightia arizonica, confined to Arizona, is very low 
and widespreading and, while hardly important, is cropped by cattle 
and sheep to some extent. 
MADDER FAMILY (RUBIACEAE) 
In dry, sandy gravelly rocky sites at low to medium elevations and 
largely in grass-weed types, in the region from western Texas to 
southern Arizona, occur three species of bouvardia (Bouvardia 
spp.). The foliage and delicate stems of these shrubby plants are 
sometimes nibbled by goats and sheep, but the species usually are 
local in distribution and not abundant. | 
Buttonbush (Cephalanthus occidentalis), known by a great num- 
ber of local names, including button tree, button willow, globe-flower, 
honeyballs, pinball, and snowball, is one of the most widely distrib- 
uted plants of North America, ranging from New Brunswick to 
western Ontario, California, and Florida. It occurs on foothills, 
but its characteristic habitat is along watercourses; it is usually a 
bush but occasionally becomes a good-sized tree. The large leaves 
are bitter tasting and unpalatable to livestock and Pammel (9) 
reports that they contain a poisonous glucoside, cephalanthin. 
The bitter bark possibly contains active chemical properties 
(G0, 61, 78, 95). Esai 
At a conservative estimate about 48 species and 9 varieties of bed- 
straw (Galiuwm spp.), known locally as cleavers, goose grass, and by 
various other names, are indigenous to the far West. Of these about 
9 species are undershrubby or shrubby, the rest being (often weak 
27259°—31——10 
