117d.  Dalea capitata Watson var. pseudo-hospes Barneby

(Plate CVI)

Branchlets glabrous; foliage yellow-green, the leaflets up to 4 mm long, punctate both sides; spikes 5-12-flowered, the axis elongating; petals gland-tipped, the keel 7.3 mm, its blades 5 mm long, 2.6 mm wide; androecium ± 8 mm long. — Collections: 1 (typus).

On limestone gravel, ± 1920 m (6400 ft), known only from the s. foothills of Cerro Pena Nevada in Sierra Madre Oriental, near Miquihuana, s.-w. Tamaulipas. — Flowering in July, probably into fall.

Dalea capitata Wats. var. pseudo-hospes (simulating and mistaken for D. hospes) Barneby, var. nov., calycis labio superiori var. lupinocalyci similis sed tubo extus ad orem ciliolatum usque glaberrimo petalisque glandula subapicali praeditis aberrans. A var capitata et var. quinqueflora praeter calycis formam alienam differt: a priori tubo calycino androecioque longioribus, foliolis superne punctatis, a secunda floribus compluribus spicatis nec paucis subumbellatis necnon bracteis parvulis. — Tamaulipas. Miquihuana: on decomposed limestone at base of hills, near reservoir of Miquihuana, July 10, 1949, Stanford, Lauber & Taylor 2388. — Holotypus, US; isotypus, UC.

A little shrub, up to 4.5 dm tall, with lemon yellow flowers. The type was distributed as D. hospes, often similar in the externally glabrous calyx and yellow petals, but very different in habit and in the pedicellate flowers. The variety suggests var. quinqueflora in foliage, var. capitata in the spike, and var. lupinocalyx in the spathaceous calyx, but is distinguished from all by the glabrous calyx-tube.