Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Subshrub

General: Herbaceous to suffrutescent perennials, (stems generally herbaceous above the caudex), herbage glabrous.

Leaves: Alternate, odd-pinnate, the pinnae and leaflets very small with small, subulate stipules, leaflets few to many, usually present on the entire stem to just below the inflorescence, surfaces glabrous.

Flowers: Sessile, in dense, softly hairy spikes, paired petals oblique-oblong, inserted above the middle of the stamen tube, the scars visible on the tube after the petals fall, the short clawed banner petals purple, sometimes with yellow centers, the claws of the wing petals very short, calyx lobes long, plumose, deltoid-subulate, shorter than or barely equaling the tube, inflorescence spikes short-cylindric to globose, less than 7 mm wide, the subtending bracts persistent, not scarious-margined or punctate, inflorescences borne at stem tips.

Fruits: Small, indehiscent pods.

Ecology: Found on hills and mountains, from 3,500-5,000 ft (1067-1524 m); flowering May-September.

Distribution: AZ, sw NM; south to n MEX.

Notes: Distinguished by being an erect perennial; hairless, delicate leaves with 10-many pairs of small leaflets; a dense, short, soft-hairy inflorescence with thin-dry bracts (scarious) without sunk-in glands (punctate) below each flower; flowers with white-purple petals. (If the plant similar and perennial with yellow flowers and scarious-margined, glandular-punctate bracts, check D. pogonathera).

Ethnobotany: There is no specific use recorded for the species, but the genus was used as food.

Etymology: Dalea is named after Samuel Dale (1659-1739), an English physician, botanist and botanical collector, and gardener who was the author of several botanical works while grayi is named after Asa Gray (1810-1888), one of the most eminent American botanists and professor at Harvard.

Synonyms: Dalea laevigata, Parosela grayi

Editor: LCrumbacher 2011, FSCoburn 2015