Astragalus lentiginosus var. ineptus

  • Title

    Astragalus lentiginosus var. ineptus

  • Authors

    Rupert C. Barneby

  • Scientific Name

    Astragalus lentiginosus var. ineptus (A.Gray) M.E.Jones

  • Description

    289f.  Astragalus lentiginosus var. ineptus

    Diffuse or decumbent, the slender stems radiating from the root-crown or caudex at or (especially in loose scree above timber line) just below soil-level, (1) 3-25 (30) cm. long, the herbage greenish-cinereous, loosely strigulose or villosulous with hairs up to 0.4-0.6 mm. long, the leaflets nearly always crowded, folded, glabrous or medially glabrescent above; leaves 1.5-5.5 cm. long, with (9) 15-21 obovate or oblanceolate, obtuse or retuse leaflets (1) 2-10 mm. long; peduncles 0.5-2 cm. long, much shorter than the leaf; racemes shortly but loosely (4) 10-21-flowered, the axis (0.3) 1-2.5 cm. long in fruit; calyx (4.8) 5.4—7.3 mm., the tube (3.6) 3.9-4.9 mm. long, 1.9-2.7 mm. in diameter, the teeth (1) 1.2-2.4 mm. long; petals whitish or cream-colored, the banner, wing- or keel-tips sometimes pink-suffused; banner (8.8) 9.8—12.2 mm. long; wings (8) 8.5—11.2 mm., the blades (4.8) 5.5—6.9 mm. long; keel 7.2-9.3 mm. long, the blades 3.6—5 mm. long; pod plumply ovoid- or ellipsoid-acuminate, 1—1.8 cm. long, the bladdery- inflated body (5) 6-12 mm. in diameter, tapering or abruptly contracted distally into the erect or incurved, triangular, unilocular beak, the thinly papery, usually faintly mottled valves becoming stramineous, somewhat lustrous, strigulose or exceptionally glabrous; ovules (12) 14—19.—Collections: 23 (ii); representative: Wiggins 9312 (POM, UC), 11,184 (NY, WS); Peirson 10,743 (RSA, UC), 10,758 (RSA); Alexander & Kellogg 4036 (NY, WS); Ripley & Barneby 4077 (CAS, RSA); J. T. Howell 23,829, 24,009 (RSA).

    Open gravelly slopes, crests, and talus, in coarse granite-sand or volcanic tuff, (6600) 7000-11,400 (12,000) feet, frequent and locally plentiful along the east face of the Sierra Nevada from Alpine County to the Inconsolable Range in Inyo County; Sweetwater Mountains, Mono County; extending just west of the Sierra crest to Bonita Meadow in Tulare County.—Map No. 128.—June to August.

    Astragalus lentiginosus var. ineptus (Gray) Jones, Rev. Astrag. 124. 1923, based on A. ineptus (awkward, the species described as "homely") Gray in Proc. Amer. Acad. 6: 525. 1864.—"Dry, rocky mountain near Sonora Pass, 9000 ft."—Holotypus, collected in 1863 by Brewer, GH! isotypi. P, UC, US!—Phaca inepta (Gray) Rydb. in Mem. N. Y. Bot. Gard. 1: 246. 1900 (quoad nom.). Cystium ineptum (Gray) Rydb. in Bull. Torr. Club 32: 659. 1905, & in op. cit. 40: 51. 1913.

    The var. ineptus is characteristically developed at elevations above 8000 feet along the dry eastern face of the Sierra escarpment, where it extends upward through the belt of Pinus aristata into the treeless zone of alpine fell-fields. In this region it is common and with the exception of a rare, high-ranging form of the ordinarily lowland var. Fremontii, which differs in its loosely racemose, purple flowers, it is the only form of A. lentiginosus to be expected. The typical and prevalent phase of var. ineptus is a slender plant, with short leaves, small and crowded, usually folded leaflets and very shortly pedunculate racemes of creamy-white flowers often tinged with dull lilac. In Mono County it descends to sandy banks and pumice fields about the head of the Owens and Walker Rivers, and there passes by imperceptibly gradual steps into the coarser, mostly more northern and lowland var. floribundus. Occasional specimens from the Sweetwater Mountains (e.g., Munz 21,234, NY) suggest passage into the closely related var. semotus, of which the ideal differential characters are mentioned below. Care is necessary in distinguishing from var. ineptus the very local Sierran endemic A. Ravenii which differs in its smaller flowers, shallowly campanulate calyx-tube, and subunilocular pod with only a quite narrow and incomplete septum. In the Sweetwater Mountains var. ineptus may be found growing with A. platytropis, the pod of which is inflated and bilocular, and which differs in its subacaulescent growth-habit and smaller, differently proportioned flowers with all petals of nearly equal length.