Mahogany Milkweed

Description

Plant: perennial herb; stems erect, unbranched, 30-100 cm tall, short woolly, especially above Leaves: opposite, the petioles 3-15 mm long, the blades elliptic-oblong to mostly broadly elliptic or ovate, 4-15 cm long, 2-10 cm broad, obtuse to rounded, truncate or shallowly cordate at the base, broadly acute to rounded at the apex, apiculate, green and glabrous to sparsely hairy above, persistently short woolly beneath, the surface conspicuously whitened from the dense mat of curly hairs INFLORESCENCE: UMBELS terminal to subterminal or lateral at the uppermost nodes, 5-8 cm broad, the peduncles 2-15 cm long Flowers: large; calyx lobes 3.5-5 mm long; corolla greenish outside, purplish inside, the lobes 8-11 mm long; hoods purple, erect-ascending, oblong-attenuate, obtuse-rounded at the apex, 6-10 mm long, 4-8 mm longer than the gynostegium, the margins with a pair of sharp teeth ca. 2 mm long arching over the stigma head, the horns absent; anther wings 2-2.4 mm long; corpusculum ca. 0.5 mm long, the pollinia 0.9-1.1 mm long Fruit: FOLLICLES erect on deflexed pedicels, 8-12 cm long Misc: Oak and pine woodlands to the ponderosa zone, mts; 1850-2550 m (6000-8300 ft); Jun-Sep REFERENCES: Sundell, Eric. 1994. Asclepiadaceae. J. Ariz. - Nev. Acad. Sci. Volume 27, 169-187.