Paronychia virginica

Plants perennial; caudex branched, woody. Stems procumbent, branched from base, hirtellose; flowering stems 7–45 cm; sterile stems 3–10 cm. Leaves: stipules narrowly lanceolate, 6–13 mm, apex acuminate, often deeply cleft; blade linear, 10–30 × 0.4–1 mm, leathery, apex short-spinose, minutely hirtellous to puberulent. Cymes terminal, 3–10+-flowered, somewhat open to compact, often forming clusters 6–30 mm wide. Flowers 5-merous, narrowly ovoid, with enlarged hypanthium and calyx tapering gradually distally, 2.8–5.1 mm, glabrous to puberulent, especially proximally; sepals brown to yellowish, midrib and lateral pair of veins prominent, lanceolate to oblong-lanceolate, 2–2.9 mm, leathery to rigid, margins whitish, 0.1–0.2 mm wide, papery, apex terminated by awn, hood rounded-triangular, awn curved outward, green to red-brown, ± conic, 0.4–1.1 mm, scabrous, distinct spine absent; staminodes filiform, 0.8–1 mm; style 1, cleft in distal 1/5, 1.2–2 mm. Utricles ovoid to obovoid, 1.8–2 mm, smooth, glabrous.

Phenology: Flowering summer–fall.
Habitat: On or among rocks
Elevation: 700-1300 m

Distribution

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Ala., Ark., D.C., Md., Mo., N.C., Okla., Tenn., Tex., Va., W.Va.

Discussion

Cory established var. scoparia for the western populations to reflect the disjunct distribution. Paronychia dichotoma (Linnaeus) Nuttall (1818), sometimes applied to this species, is a later homonym of P. dichotoma de Candolle (1805); see E. L. Core (1940).

Selected References

None.

Lower Taxa

None.