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Marina calycosa

Marina calycosa (A. Gray) Barneby

San Pedro False Prairie-clover

Fabaceae (Pea family)

Synonym(s): Dalea calycosa

USDA Symbol: MACA8

USDA Native Status: L48 (N)

"Dwarf, loosely tufted, with a tortuous perennial root and short caudex or knotty root-crown situated 1-3 cm below soil-level, the slender, decumbent and incurved, eglandular or obscurely and remotely glandular, purplish or stramineous stems 5-20 cm long, simple or more often branched (upward from near base or only distally) at 1-5 nodes, the first raceme leaf-opposed, the rest usually terminal to branchlets, the stems and foliage strigulose with appressed and narrowly ascending hairs up to 0.25-0.5 mm long, commonly gray or canescent, neither glandular nor punctate, the leaflets lineolate both sides, brighter green above than below, those of early leaves often glabrous above or on both sides but always ciliolate, those of later leaves, sometimes of all, pubescent both sides, the inflorescences silky-hirsute." (bibref: 1812).

"This delightful little species together with the closely related but geographically disjunct M. orcuttii is distinguished from all Chrysorrhizae in northern Mexico by its nodding flowers and from all members of the genus so far as known in the subterranean points of renewal on the caudex. With the exception of M. parryi, a plant of the Sonoran Desert distinguished by strongly warty stems and open racemes of small ascending flowers, it is the most northern Marina, inhabiting a region where light frost and some snow must be expected every winter, and this may account for the retreat below ground level of the buds from which growth starts in spring. Another unique feature of M. calycosa is the lack of post-petiolular glands, and the absence or extreme reduction of glands on the stems and dorsal face of the leaflets." (bibref: 1812).

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Plant Characteristics

Duration: Perennial
Habit: Herb
Leaf Arrangement: Alternate
Fruit Type: Legume
Size Notes: "Stems 5-20 cm long." (bibref: 1812).
Leaf: "Leaf-spurs 0.2-1 mm long; stipules lanceolate or lance-acuminate, (1) 1.5-3.5 mm long, purplish-castaneous becoming papery, thinly strigulose dorsally, the margins sometimes charged with a few minute processes; intra- and post-petiolular glands 0; leaves 1-3 cm long, shortly petioled, with subterete rachis and (4) 5-12 (17) pairs of obovate to oblong-obovate, retuse, commonly folded, sometimes obtusely gland-tipped leaflets 1.5-7 mm long." (bibref: 1812).
Flower: "Peduncles 0.3-3 cm long; racemes when young lanceolate in outline becoming narrowly oblong, the flowers early declined, 2-3-ranked when pressed, without petals (10) 11-14 mm diameter, the pilosulous axis (1) 1.5-6.5 cm long; bracts early deciduous, narrowly lanceolate or lance-acuminate, 2.5-4 mm long, livid or castaneous becoming papery, thinly pilosulous but glandless dorsally, the margins sometimes gland-spurred; pedicels 0.3-0.6 mm long, glandless at apex; calyx at anthesis 5.2-7 mm long (slightly accrescent thereafter), silvery-hirsutulous with lustrous hairs up to 0.65-1.1 mm long, the tube 1.8-2.5 mm, the ribs slender, pallid or castaneous, becoming prominent, the finally recessed, membranous intervals charged with 1 row of 5 elliptic glands, the teeth lance-elllptic, herbaceous, finely net-veined, slightly unequal, the dorsal one longest, 3.2-5.1 mm long, the ventral pair shortest but hardly broader than the rest; petals (tardily deciduous) bicolored, whitish-flesh-colored and dull blue or brownish purple, the banner blade margined (at base or all around) and the inner margins of wings and keel striped lengthwise with the deeper color, the banner (and sometimes the keel-blade) charged with a few small glands, the wings and keel inserted 1 mm or less beyond the hypanthium rim; banner 3.7-5 mm long, the claw 2-2.8 mm, the deltate-cordate and acutish or reniform and emarginate blade 2.2-3.3 mm long, 3.2-4.4 mm wide; wings 4.5-6.3 mm long, the claw 1.5-2.1 mm, the obliquely ovate blade 3.3-4.2 mm long, 2.1-2.8 mm wide; keel 6.3-9.4 mm long, the claws (1.6) 2-3.8 mm, the broadly ovate or obovate blades 4.3-5.8 mm long, 3-3.7 mm wide; androecium 10-merous, about 7 - 8 mm long, the longer filaments free for 2.5-3 mm, the connective gland-tipped, the anthers pale bluish, 0.7-1 mm long." (bibref: 1812).
Fruit: "Pod 2.6-3 mm long, obliquely obovate in profile, the style-base terminal but eccentric, the papery valves pilosulous, charged with 2 subvertical gland-crescents; seed about 2 mm long (little known)." (bibref: 1812).

Bloom Information

Bloom Color: White , Blue , Purple , Brown
Bloom Time: Apr , May , Jun
Bloom Notes: "Petals (tardily deciduous) bicolored, whitish-flesh-colored and dull blue or brownish purple. Flowering primarily in spring, Apill into early June, sometimes again following summer or fall rains." (bibref: 1812).

Distribution

USA: AZ , NM
Native Distribution: "Local but forming colonies, best known and most often collected from round the eastern margins of the Sonoran Desert, on the upper Gila River and its affluents in southern Arizona (Pinal, Pima, Cochise, Graham, Santa Cruz counties) and adjoining southwestern New Mexico (Grant County) and northern Sonora (Municipios Santa Cruz and Bacoachic); apparently isolated in west-central Chihuahua (environs of Ciudad Chihuahua), but the full range in Mexico probably not yet documented; reported (Rydberg, 1919, p. 62) from Nuevo Leon, but no specimens found." (bibref: 1812).
Native Habitat: "Open stony hillsides in arid grassland, ascending into the oak-belt, mostly between 1200 and 1770 m ( � 4000-5900 feet)." (bibref: 1812).

Bibliography

Bibref 1812 - Daleae imagines : an illustrated revision of Errazurizia Philippi, Psorothamnus Rydberg, Marina Leibmann, and Dalea Lucanus emend. Barneby, including all species of Leguminosae tribe Amorpheae Borissova ever referred to Dalea (1977) Barneby, Rupert C.

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Additional resources

USDA: Find Marina calycosa in USDA Plants
FNA: Find Marina calycosa in the Flora of North America (if available)
Google: Search Google for Marina calycosa

Metadata

Record Modified: 2020-12-07
Research By: Joseph A. Marcus

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