Common Name: smooth ayenia

Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Shrub

General: Shrub 10-45 cm tall, the branches and leaves sparsely stellate puberulent when young, glabrate as it ages.

Leaves: On petioles 1-6 cm long, the leaves broadly ovate to lance-ovate, 2.5-8 cm wide, 4-10 cm long, subcordate at base, acute at apex, crenate dentate, green on both sides, but paler below.

Flowers: On slender peduncle 5-12 mm long, usually 1-4 , often with several peduncles in a single axil, the flower very unique with 5 sepals and petals, the petals hood shaped and canopy-like with slender bases with the top attached to the stamen tube, the 5 stamens alternating with sterile stamens, the sepals usually purplish, but rarely greenish, the petals brownish and lacking dorsal appendages.

Fruits: Capsule 5-6 mm in diameter, minutely puberulent.

Ecology: Found on slopes, often on rocky slopes, and in canyon bottoms and among shrubs in the flats below 4,000 ft (1219 m), flowers August-November.

Distribution: Ranges south from southern Arizona to Guerrero state in southern Mexico.

Notes: Distinguished by the large ovate leaves and the lack of dorsal appendages on the petals, very similar to A. filiformis but the leaves distinguish the two.

Ethnobotany: Unknown

Etymology: Ayenia is named for Louis de Noailles (1713-1793) the Duke of d-Ayen, while glabra means smooth or hairless.

Synonyms: None

Editor: SBuckley 2011