90b.  Dalea elegans Gillies var. elegans

(Plate LXXXIX)

Primary cauline leaves mostly 1-3.5 cm long; spikes mostly 1-5 (7) cm long; dorsal calyx-tooth mostly 2-3.3 mm long. — Collections: 15 (o).

Dry rocky hillsides and outwash slopes, 1050-2000 m, along the e. piedmont of the Argentine Andes from Sierra del Morro in e. San Luis, n. through Sierras Grande and Chica in Cordoba; apparently disjunct in Salta (Depto La Candelaria).— Flowering December to March .—Representative: Salta: Schreiter 9235 (F, UC, US). Cordoba: Burkart 7405 (F); Ledingham & Hunziker 4482, 4485 (NY); Good- speed 17,235 (UC); Genevieve Dawson 77 (NY).

Dalea elegans (elegant) Gill, ex H. & A. in Hook., Bot. Miscell. 3: 183. 1833.— "El Cerro del Morro (Prov. of San Luis), Dr. Gillies." — Holotypus, K (herb. Hook.)! isotypus (Gillies 263), OXF!

Dalea stenophylla Grsb., Abh. Wiss. Gotting. 19: 118 [Pl. Lorentz. 69] 1874. — "209.... Cordoba, in regione superiori Sierra de Cordoba pr. S. Bartolo." — Holotypus, presumably GOET, not examined; isotypus formerly B survives, with fragm. (F) as Field Neg. 2040!

The xerophytic counterpart of var. onobrychioides, occupying a lower, dryer belt along the foothills of the eastern Cordilleras. Burkart (1952, p. 253) has already correctly equated D. stenophylla with D. elegans, but cites the latter only from Sierras de San Luis and Cordoba. The cited collection from Salta (Cuesta de Muquillo, dep. La Canderlaria) is entirely typical of var. elegans, even to flower-color, noted by the collector as rosada. Burkart (1952) has pointed out that it is the close folding of the leaflets that makes them appear so narrow; but they are also smaller and more fleshy than those of var. onobrychioides.