Plant: perennial herb; trailing stems with a mixture of stellate hairs and lepidote scales

Leaves: triangular, acute, irregularly dentate, 1-2 cm long

Flowers: solitary in leaf axils; with the pedicel subequal to the corresponding leaf; involucel usually absent; calyx 6-8 mm long, lepidote; petals 12-15 mm long

Fruit: FRUITS an oblate schizocarp, 5-6 mm diameter; mericarps ca. 7, dorsally rounded; SEEDS solitary, glabrous

Misc: Usually in heavy, saline soils on roadsides or mud flats; 1350-1700 m (4500-5500 ft); flowering throughout the year

REFERENCES: Fryxell, Paul A. 1994. Malvaceae. J. Ariz. - Nev. Acad. Sci. Volume 27(2), 222-236.

Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Forb/Herb

General: Decumbent to prostrate perennial 20-40 cm long, with densely silvery-lepidote to scalelike stellate hairs.

Leaves: Triangular-ovate or triangular-lanceolate, 20-40 mm long, sinuate-dentate, acute to acuminate at the apex, not hastate at the base, densely scurfy-stellate.

Flowers: Lower pedicels often elongate and deflexed incurved in fruit; calyx 4-8 mm long, lobes acuminate, subtending bractlets absent, petals white to achroleucous, 10-12 mm long.

Fruits: Carpels rounded and dehiscent at the apex, 8-9 per flower.

Ecology: Found on dry soils from 1,000-6,000 ft (305-1829 m); flowers April-October.

Notes: Distinctive with its triangular-ovate, dentate and barely hastate leaves, covered in dense silvery lepidote hairs.

Ethnobotany: Unknown

Etymology: Malvella is a diminutive of Malva meaning little malva, while lepidota is from lepis, scale and the suffix ota, indicating possession, so having small scurfy scales.

Synonyms: Sida lepidota, S. leprosa var. depauperata

Editor: SBuckley, 2010