FLOWERING PLANTS AND FERNS OF ARIZONA 205 



Yavapai Counties, arid hills, 2,000 to 4,500 feet, June. Western 

 Arizona, southern California, and Baja California. 



In Arizona the species does not colonize appreciably, although the 

 plants produce offsets freely. 



6. Agave parryi^Engelm., Acad. Sci. St. Louis Trans. 3: 311. 1875. 



Agave huachucensis Baker, Handb. Amaryllid. 172. 1882. 



Central and southeastern Arizona, mountains, 4,500 to 8,000 feet, 

 June to July, type probably from Graham County (Rothrock 274). 

 New Mexico, Arizona, and northern Mexico. 



In the typical form the leaves are compactly imbricate, broadly 

 oblong, one-third to two-fifths as wide as long, 10 to 15 cm. wide, 30 to 

 40 cm. long, with a stout end spine, flowers 50 to 60 mm. long. The var. 

 couesii (Engelm.) Kearney and Peebles (A. couesii Engelm.), occurring 

 in Yavapai and Gila Counties, sometimes with the typical form, is a 

 somewhat smaller plant with flowers 25 to 50 mm. long and leaves 

 less closely imbricate, oblong to lanceolate, one-fifth to one-third as 

 wide as long. In the robust form A. huachucensis, known only from 

 the general vicinity of the Huachuca Mountains, the leaves are up to 

 35 cm. wide and up to 65 cm. long, and the flowers up to 75 mm. long 

 (pi. 13). 



7. Agave palmeri Engelm., Acad. Sci. St. Louis Trans. 3: 319. 1875. 

 Graham, Cochise, Santa Cruz, and Pima Counties, in the mountains, 



3,500 to 6,500 feet, July to August. New Mexico, southern Arizona, 

 and Sonora. 



The original description was based on several Arizona collections. 



8. Agave chrysantha Peebles, Biol. Soc. Wash. Proc. 48: 139. 1935. 

 Gila, Pinal, and Pima Counties, in the mountains, 3,000 to 7,000 feet, 



common along the Apache Trail, June to August, type from the Pinal 

 Mountains. Known only from Arizona . 



9. Agave murpheyi Gibson, Boyce Thompson Inst. Contrib. 7: 83. 



1935. 

 Paradise Valley (Maricopa County), Roosevelt and Tonto Basin 

 (Gila County), Queen Creek near Superior, the type locality (Pinal 

 County) , March and April. Known only from Arizona . 



19. IRIDACEAE. Iris family 



Perennial herbs ; flowering stems from rootstocks or bulbs ; leaves long 

 and narrow, 2-ranked, equitant (folded together lengthwise and 

 enfolding one another) ; flowers perfect, regular or nearly so, subtended 

 by spathelike bracts; stamens 3, inserted on the perianth; style 3-cleft; 

 ovary inferior; fruit a 3-celled dehiscent, many-seeded capsule. 



Key to the genera 



1. Sepals recurved, longer than the erect petals; style branches petallike, opposite 

 to and overarching the stamens; filaments separate; flowers about 8 cm. in 



diameter I 1. [ris. 



1. Sepals and petals alike, all spreading; style branches not petallike; filaments 

 more or less united; flowers not more than 6 cm. in diameter (2). 

 2. Flowering stems from a tunicate bulb; style 3-branched, the branches 2-eleft 



or 2-parted 2. Nbmastylis. 



2. Flowering stems from a short rootstock, this often nearly obsolete: style 

 entire or, if 3-branched, the branches entire. __ 3. Sistrinchium. 



