274 



PLATANACEiE, 



1£ to 2 ft. high, the branches of the season or preceding season 

 with soft prickles and weak spines, the older brunches unarmed and 

 with gray-brown bark; young herbage hirsutulous and very viscid- 

 glandular; leaves ^ to 1^ in. long, crenately incised, distinctly 

 5-lobed, the lower pair much smaller; flowers 8 lines long, on long 

 (1 to 1^ in.) slender pedicels which bear an ovate bract 1 line long 

 close below the flower, or the bracts 2 and the flowers as many; 

 sepals dull white; petals clear white, similar to no. 7; filaments 

 stoutish, much surpassing the petals; fruit golden yellow, 7 or 8 

 lines in diameter, densely covered with slender prickles. 



Marin Co., Chesnut; near Sonoma; inner North Coast Ranges 

 (Vaca Mountains), where it is the onlv Gooseberrv, so far as known. 

 Mar. 



6. R. Californicum H. & A. Hillside Gooseberry. Compact 

 shrub, with more or less flexuous branches, 2£ to 4 ft. high; leaves 

 at flowering time mostly J to f in. broad, the entire upper surface 

 glandular-shining; flowers solitary (sometimes 2), 5 lines long; pedicels 

 with a couple of shallowly lobecl bracts at middle; calyx greenish, 

 purplish-tinged, glabrous; petals white, and convolute as in no. 7; 

 ovary covered with soft bristles interspersed with short gland-tipped 

 hairs. 



Dry exposed slopes of the Berkeley Hills. Feb. -Mar. To be 

 distinguished from the preceding by its greenish calyx which is 

 glabrous externally and by the soft non-glandular bristles of the 

 ovary. Doubtless not worthy of full specific rank. 



7. R. Menziesii Pursh. Canon Gooseberry. Tall openly 

 branched shrub, 4 to 8 ft. high; stems with mostly 3 strong spines 

 at the nodes and also more or less prickly, especially on the sterile 

 Shoots; pedicels 1 or 2-flowered, the bractlet rather near the flower; 

 flowers | in. long; exterior of calyx more or less glandular-pubescent, 

 its lobes lurid-purple, 3 lines long, closely reflexed; petals white, 

 waxy, involute from each edge, truncate and often minutely crenulate- 

 toothed at apex, 2 lines long, the stamens nearly twice as long; style 

 exceeding the stamens, 2-cleft at apex; ovary covered with short 

 hairs, the hairs capitate-glandular. — (R. subvestitum H. & A.) 



Outer Coast Ranges of Middle California. The flowers appear in 

 Jim. or Feb. from winter buds, the scales of which are homologous 

 to petioles. 



62. PLATA NACE/E. Plank-tree Family. 



Large trees with alternate ample palmately lobed leaves and 

 sheathing stipules; dilated base of petiole enclosing the bud of the 

 next season; bark falling away in thin plates. Inflorescence con- 

 sisting of spherical or head-like clusters distributed at intervals along 

 a terminal very slender axis and thus appearing moniliform. Flowers 

 monoecious, the staminate and the pistillate on separate axes. Calyx 

 and corolla none. Stamens with long anthers and very short fila- 

 ments densely crowded on a globose fleshy receptacle. Receptacle 



