Erythranthe minor
Phytoneuron 2012-39: 44. 2012.
Perennials, rhizomatous, colonial, rhizomes forming a mass, branching, filiform. Stems erect to erect-ascending, branched, 5–20 cm, densely minutely hirtellous and eglandular or with a mixture of hirtellous and gland-tipped hairs. Leaves basal and cauline; petiole 0 mm or proximals 1–3 mm; blade palmately 3-veined, broadly ovate to elliptic-ovate or lanceolate, 8–25 × 5–15 mm, base cuneate to truncate, margins shallowly dentate to denticulate, apex acute to obtuse, surfaces glabrous. Flowers herkogamous, 1–3, from distal nodes. Fruiting pedicels 10–20 mm, densely minutely hirtellous and eglandular or with a mixture of hirtellous and gland-tipped hairs. Fruiting calyces nodding 80–100º, not purple-dotted, cylindric-campanulate, inflated, sagittally compressed, 10–13 mm, densely minutely hirtellous and eglandular or with a mixture of hirtellous and gland-tipped hairs, throat closing. Corollas yellow, not red-dotted, bilaterally symmetric, bilabiate; tube-throat tubular-funnelform, 9–11 mm, exserted 0–1(–2) mm beyond calyx margin. Styles sparsely hirtellous. Anthers included, glabrous. Capsules included, 5–8 mm.
Phenology: Flowering Jul–Aug(–Sep).
Habitat: Stream and lake edges, intermittent subalpine water courses, roadside ditches, subalpine to alpine.
Elevation: 3000–3700 m.
Discussion
The corollas of Erythranthe minor are shorter than those of typical E. tilingii, and the two species are allopatric. Corollas of E. tilingii rarely may be equally as short as those of E. minor but are produced in scattered localities on plants that are depauperate in other ways. The range of E. minor is primarily in Colorado apparently extending southward into the Wheeler Peak area of Taos County, New Mexico. Attribution of its range into the La Sal Mountains of east-central Utah has been based on misidentifications of E. guttata; the distinction between E. guttata and E. minor in Colorado also needs clarification.
Mimulus luteus Linnaeus var. alpinus A. Gray (1863, the type from Colorado) is an illegitimate name for Erythranthe minor, preceded by M. luteus var. alpinus Lindley (1827).
Selected References
None.