Duration: Annual

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Forb/Herb

General: Small annual herbs, 4-20 cm tall; stems ascending to erect, sometimes prostrate and spreading; herbage strigose.

Leaves: Generally alternate, sessile; blades 0.5-4 cm long, linear, strigose to sharp-bristled.

Flowers: Tiny and white, on pedicels that recurve and extend in fruit to 2-3 mm long; calyx lobes free, equal in length; corolla funnel-shaped, white, the limb 0.5-2.5 mm wide.

Fruits: Nutlets 4, together forming a cross-shape; each nutlet 2.5-4 mm long, linear, coiled to recurved, with a toothed margin inconspicuously differing in texture from the rest of the nutlet; margin teeth free to the base, narrow, the teeth clearly longer than

Ecology: Found in the shelter of rocks, at bases of shrubs, and occasionally on roadsides, in creosote-bush scrub and Joshua-tree woodland, below 5,000 ft (1524 m); flowers February-May.

Distribution: s CA, AZ, s NV, s UT, sw NM; south to n MEX.

Notes: P. recurvata is a fairly common annual herb in the low deserts. The genus is characterized by the plus-sign shape that the nutlets form together. P. recurvata is distinguished from other Pectocarya spp. by the strongly recurved nutlets with sharp, narrow, deeply dissected teeth around the edges; P. platycarpa nutlets are less strongly recurved and have broad, conspicuous margins with wide, fused teeth; P. heterocarpa has two somewhat straight nutlets with conspicuous margins and two recurved nutlets with inconspicuous margins out of each set of four.

Ethnobotany: Unknown

Etymology: Pectocarya is from the Greek pectos, combed and karua, nut; recurvata refers to the strongly recurved shape of the nutlets.

Synonyms: None

Editor: AHazelton 2015