Physaria cinerea

Perennials; caudex branched, (woody); densely pubescent, trichomes (appressed, except spreading on pedicels and fruits, sessile or short-stalked), several- rayed, rays furcate or bifurcate, (strongly tuberculate throughout). Stems few from base, erect, (stout), to 1.5 dm (sometimes greatly reduced). Basal leaves: blade suborbicular to rhombic or broadly elliptic, 1-4.5 cm, margins entire, (apex rounded to subacute). Cauline leaves: (proximal petiolate, distal subsessile); blade elliptic, 1-4 cm, (distal narrower), margins entire or remotely dentate. Racemes condensed, (subcorymbose to subumbellate, few-flowered). Fruiting pedicels (horizontal or divaricate-ascending, straight or slightly curved), 5-15 mm, (stout and rigid). Flowers: sepals (persistent), broadly ovate or oblong to narrowly elliptic, 5.5-8(-9.5) mm, (lateral pair slightly cucullate, median pair thickened apically, cucullate, usually keeled); petals (orange to yellow), oblong to obovate, 8-11.5 (-14.5) mm, (slightly narrowed to broad claw, margins sinuate, often retuse). Fruits (sessile or substipitate), globose, ovoid, or suborbicular, compressed (with marginal and apical constriction), 4-7 mm; valves pubescent, trichomes contiguous or overlapping, often spreading; ovules 16-24 per ovary; style 2-4 mm. Seeds lenticular, ovate in outline. 2n = 10.

Flowering Mar-May. Red soil, chiprock, gypsum or chalky knolls, limestone rubble; 900-2200 m; Ariz.

Duration: Perennial Nativity: Native Lifeform: Forb/Herb Synonyms: Lesquerella cinerea