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Dalea searlsiae
Dalea searlsiae (A. Gray) Barneby
Searls' Prairie Clover
Fabaceae (Pea family)
Synonym(s): Petalostemon searlsiae
USDA Symbol: DASE3
USDA Native Status: L48 (N)
"Perennial herbs from a woody root and short caudex, (2.5) 3-5.5 dm tall, commonly glabrous (except for ciliolate stipules) up to the spikes, more rarely villosulous throughout with fine spreading hairs up to 0.2-0.5 mm long, the several stems either diffuse and incurved or erect and ascending in clumps, pallid, striate-ribbed, ± tuberculate, leafy through lower 1/2-1/3 and bearing axillary leafy spurs at most nodes, either monocephalous or some lateral shoots from near base or near middle developed and going out into a spike shorter than the terminal one, the foliage pallid green or subglaucescent, the thick-textured leaflets not or scarcely bicolored, smooth and green above, gland-tuberculate beneath." (bibref: 1812).
"Prairie-clover of arid Southwestern United States, with thick-textured, glaucescent foliage and moderately dense spikes of rose-purple flowers; the virgate stems of D. searlsiae, which ranges over the western half of the Great Basin into the northern and eastern Mohave Desert and northwestern Arizona, are erect-ascending and simple or few-branched; the leaves vary from glabrous to pilosulous, and the flowers mature in late spring and early summer, seldom later than mid-July; calyx deeply recessed behind the banner and in fruit constricted just above the base." (bibref: 1812).
From the Image Gallery
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Plant Characteristics
Duration: PerennialHabit: Herb
Leaf Arrangement: Alternate
Fruit Type: Legume
Size Notes: "(2.5) 3-5.5 dm tall." (bibref: 1812).
Leaf: "Leaf-spurs 0.2-1 mm long; stipules narrowly subulate or linear, castaneous or castaneous-tipped, 1-2.5 (3) mm long, early papery and fragile; intrapetlolular glands present, small; post-petiolular glands large, prominent, obtuse; leaves short-petioled, the main cauline ones 2-5.5 cm long, with narrowly thick-margined, ventrally grooved rachis and 2-3 (4) pairs of narrowly to broadly oblanceolate, oblong-elliptic, or obovate, emarginate, obtuse, or bluntly gland-mucronulate, usually folded and often backwardly arched leaflets up to 7-17 (20) mm long, the terminal one at least slightly longer than last pair." (bibref: 1812).
Flower: "Peduncles (2.5) 4-16 (20) cm long; spikes moderately dense but not conelike, the flowers (pressed) falling into 3-4 irregular ranks and often partially exposing the viUosulous or glabrate axis, without petals narrowly oblong-cylindroid, (8) 9-11 mm diameter, (1.5) 2-9 (14) cm long; bracts mostly deciduous by late anthesis, hardly dimorphic except the lowest a trifle firmer and broader than the rest, the interfloral ones 3-5 (6) cm long, folded and scarious at base, lanceolate or lance-caudate and firm distally, dorsally pilose, pilosulous, or glabrous, sparsely glandular, commonly livid-tipped; calyx (3.2) 3.5-4.6 (4.8) mm long, variably pubescent, always pilose or pilosulous on and within the teeth with weak spreading hairs up to 0.4-1.3 mm long, the ovoid tube varying from densely pilosulous to glabrous, this 2-2.8 mm long, deeply cleft behind banner, the ribs slender, not prominent, the pallid submembranous intervals often flecked with lines of castaneous cells, glandless or charged above middle with 2-4 small pale glands, the teeth of about equal length but dissimilar in shape, the dorsal 3 lance-subulate, (0.8) 1-2.2 mm long (0.2-1.4, rarely 1.9 mm shorter than tube), the ventral pair deltateovate, all green or livid at tip; petals rose-purple, eglandular (or banner rarely charged at base of blade with 2 (4) minute glands); banner 5.3-7.2 mm long, the claw (2.5) 2.7-3.5 mm, the ovate, ovate-deltate, or narrowly ovate-oblong, usually subcordate, obtuse or emarginate, slightly hooded blade 2.8-3.7 mm long, 2.2-3.4 mm wide; epistemonous petals (3.6) 3.8-4.8 mm long, the claw 0.6-0.9 mm, the oblong or oblanceolate, truncate-emarginate or very obtuse blades either tapering or abruptly narrowed at base, (2.7) 3-4.1 mm long, (0.9) 1.1-1.6 mm wide; androecium 5.5-8.5 mm long, the column (2.2) 2.6-3.6 mm, the free filaments (3) 3.4-5.1 mm long, usually pink, the yellow anthers 1.1-1.5 mm long." (bibref: 1812).
Fruit: "Pod half-obovate in profile, 3.2-4 mm long, the style-base latero-terminal, the prow moderately thickened, the valves papery except at extreme base, distally gland-sprinkled, either pilosulous or subglabrous; seed 2-2.8 mm long." (bibref: 1812).
Bloom Information
Bloom Color: Pink , PurpleBloom Time: May , Jun , Jul
Bloom Notes: "Petals rose-purple." (bibref: 1812).
Distribution
USA: AZ , CA , NV , UTNative Distribution: "Widespread and locally abundant over the southern half of Nevada, southwestern Utah, and adjoining Cahfornia and Arizona, westerward into the edge of the Mohave Desert (Providence and New York mountains). Death Valley, and Inyo Mountains, northward in Nevada to Paradise Range in Churchill County and the Snake Range in White Pine County, southward in Arizona to Coconino Plateau in northwestern Mohave and Coconino counties, eastward up the Virgin River and through the Dixie Corridor into the western margins of the Canyonlands, in Utah to the Pahria River and Aquarius Plateau and in Arizona to the lower Littie Colorado and Painted Desert in Coconino County; apparently disjunctly around the western margin of Salt Lake Desert in eastern Elko County, Nevada, and adjoining Box Elder County, Utah." (bibref: 1812).
Native Habitat: "Dry bluffs and hillsides, sandy and rocky flats, sometimes on clay knolls of the valley floor, commonly calciphile but sometimes on sandstones and perhaps other bedrock, (1100) 1230-1980 m (3700-6600 ft); in Inyo Mountains. rarely to 2280 m (7600 ft)." (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.Search More Titles in Bibliography
Additional resources
USDA: Find Dalea searlsiae in USDA PlantsFNA: Find Dalea searlsiae in the Flora of North America (if available)
Google: Search Google for Dalea searlsiae
Metadata
Record Modified: 2020-12-07Research By: Joseph A. Marcus