Duration: Perennial

Lifeform: Forb/Herb

General: Perennial, 5-30 cm tall; plants acaulescent; caudex simple or branched, with persistent old leaf bases; taproot deep, slender, woody or fleshy.

Leaves: Basal, alternate, compound, ovate in outline, 2-13 cm long, ternate then 3 times pinnate, the ultimate segments 1-5 mm long, 0.5-2.5 mm wide, crowded and typically angled upward to give the overall leaf a 3-dimensional appearance, pubescent, whitish or bluish green; blades sessile or petiole up to 2.5 cm long, sometimes with a purple dilated sheath.

Flowers: Inflorescence of terminal and axillary compound umbels, terminal umbel sometimes subtended by a whorl of 3-12 lateral umbels, rays 7-27, 2.5-8 cm long; phyllaries absent; pedicels 5-12 mm long, subtended by 1-3 linear, usually deciduous bractlets, 5 mm long; petals white; stamens white; styles about 0.5 mm long; flowers June- August.

Fruits: Schizocarp, ovate, oblong, or orbicular, 5-11 mm long, 3- 7 mm wide, pubescent, lateral wings 1-2 mm wide, dorsal ribs threadlike.

Ecology: Open, dry slopes or flats, frequently in rocky and calcareous soils; 1200-2700 m (3900-9000 ft); Coconino, Mohave, Navajo, and Yavapai counties; central and western U.S.

Notes: Our specimens, as here described, are ssp. macdougalii. Plants of Lomatium nevadense (Nevada biscuitroot, Parish-s biscuitroot) are acaulescent or short- caulescent; taproot slender, the base tuberous-thickened; leaves are basal, sometimes cauline, with 1-2 leaves arising from the basal portion of the stem, 2.5-9 cm long, usually 2-3 times pinnately compound, ultimate segments 1-27 mm long, held more-or-less flat, blue-green to gray-green, pubescent; inflorescence a terminal compound umbel arising from a peduncle 7-33 cm long, with 7-22 unequal rays 1-5 cm long; pedicels 4-14 mm long, subtended by bractlets linear to narrowly elliptic, 2-3 mm long, margins scarious; petals white; stamens white, anthers purple to sometimes yellow. Our specimens, as here described, are var. parishii.

Editor: Springer et al. 2008

Lvs numerous, to 2 dm (petiole included), cleft to the base into 3 divisions, each of these 3-pinnate, the ultimate segments linear, 2-5 mm; scape 1-2.5 dm; bractlets united to or beyond the middle; pet yellow; fr 6-9 mm; 2n=22. Prairies and plains; Man., Mo., and Tex. to Mont., Ida., and Ariz. barely entering our range in Io. and Mo. Apr. Var. foeniculaceum, mainly of the n. Great Plains, has evidently pubescent herbage, ovaries, and frs, or the frs are sometimes glabrous at maturity. Var. daucifolium (Torr. & A. Gray) Cronquist, mainly of the s. Great Plains, has scantily pubescent or glabrate herbage, and glabrous ovaries and frs.

Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

©The New York Botanical Garden. All rights reserved. Used by permission.