Physaria alpina

Perennials; (with a long taproot), caudex usually buried, simple, (enlarged, covered with marcescent leaf bases, crown rosulate and horizontal to somewhat ascending, forming a dense crown at apex of caudex); (silvery) pubescent throughout, trichomes (sessile or stipitate), 5-8-rayed, rays furcate or bifurcate, (rounded to umbonate, strongly tuberculate, less so or smooth over center). Stems few from base, decumbent, (arising laterally proximal to current season´s leaves), 0.3-0.8 dm. Basal leaves: (petiole slender); blade broadly obovate, or deltate to ovate or narrower, 1.5-3.5 cm, (base abruptly to gradually narrowed to petiole), margins entire or obscurely few-toothed, (apex usually obtuse, nearly acute in narrower leaves). Cauline leaves: (2-5 per stem); blade oblanceolate to spatulate, similar to basal, margins entire, (apex acute). Racemes loose, (3-6-flowered). Fruiting pedicels (widely spreading to ascending, slightly curved or straight), 7-11 mm. Flowers: sepals narrowly oblong to linear, 7-9 mm; petals (erect), spatulate, 10-12(-15) mm. Fruits (usually purplish in age), didymous, irregular and somewhat angular, not highly inflated, 4-11 × 10-13 mm, (coriaceous, papery, shallowly grooved distally and on sides, tapered and narrowed toward replum, base obtuse to truncate, apex with broad sinus to nearly truncate); valves (retaining seeds after dehiscence), densely pubescent, not silvery; replum elliptic to obovate, as wide as or wider than fruit, base rounded, margins sparsely pubescent or glabrous, apex rounded with funicles); ovules 4 per ovary; style 5-7 mm, (glabrous). Seeds flattened.

Flowering Jun-Jul. Whitish or red substrates from limestone or dolomite, ridge crests, rocky alpine tundra and open areas; of conservation concern; 3500-4000 m; Colo.