Alpine flora of the Canadian Rocky MountainsBrown, Stewardson
Science
Alpine flora of the Canadian Rocky Mountains
Brown, Stewardson
Mountain plants -- Canadian Rockies (B.C. and Alta.)
Copiously glandular-hairy, 4—15 inches tall. Leaves crowded on the
short rootstock, spatulate to oblanceolate-spatulate, 1—3 inches
long, sharply and sometimes broadly toothed, mostly above the middle.
Flower-stems solitary or several together, widely branching, bracts
much smaller than the leaves; flowers terminating the stem, branches,
and branchlets, but on many of the ultimate branchlets represented by
clusters of green bulblets; sepals oblong-ovate to triangular-ovate, ⅙
of an inch or less long, purple, reflexed; petals white, ¼ of an inch
long or less, the three upper with lanceolate or oblong-lanceolate
blades; two lower with elliptic or spatulate-elliptic blades; seed
pods ¼ of an inch long with diverging tips. The commonest form in the
Selkirks, everywhere along streams and banks.
[Sidenote: =Leptarrhena pyrolifolia= (D. Don.) R. Br. _Leptarrhena._]
Caudex horizontal or ascending, clothed with folded leaf bases. Leaves
leathery, oblong, or sometimes slightly broadest above or below
the middle, 1½—3½ inches long, obtuse, serrate or crenate-serrate,
deep green and lustrous above, paler beneath, narrowed into winged
petiole-like bases. Flower-stalks 4—18 inches high, bearing 1 or 2
clasping leaves; flowers small and inconspicuous, at first congested in
a compact head, becoming separated; sepals ovate, about as long as the
base of the calyx, each with a terminal gland and usually some lateral
glands; petals narrowly spatulate, white, ⅛ of an inch long; seed pods
¼ of an inch long with slightly spreading tips; purplish.
Along alpine streams and in damp shaded places, rather abundant
throughout the region at the higher altitudes; flowering in June.
[Sidenote: =Leptasea Van-Bruntiæ= Small. _Fleshy Saxifrage._]
Stems decumbent. Leaves ⅛—½ of an inch long, the blades very thick,
flattish, smooth, ciliate on the margins, spine-tipped. Flowers
1—several on stalks, 1½—3 inches tall, finely glandular-hairy, leafy,
bearing larger leaves than the decumbent stems; sepals ovate to
oblong-ovate, ⅛ of an inch long, smooth, more or less eroded at the
apex; petals deep yellow, oblong, much longer than the calyx; seed pods
¼ of an inch or more long.
A common species throughout the Rockies, forming mats on the wet gravel
and sand of the shores and flood-plains of the rivers and torrent fans
at the bases of the moraines; flowering throughout June and July.
[Sidenote: =Leptasea austromontana= (Wiegand) Small. _Common
Saxifrage._]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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