Ephedra monosperma

J.G. Gmelin ex C.A. Meyer 1846

Common names

单子麻黄 dan zi ma huang (Chinese) (Fu et al. 1999).

Taxonomic notes

Syn.: Ephedra minima K.S. Hao; Ephedra monostachya Turcz.; Ephedra polygonoides Siev.

Description

Small shrub (to 25 cm tall) often with long subterranean trunks or creeping runners; woody stems short, 1-5 cm, much branched, rigid, ascending, nodes knotted. Branchlets yellow-green, striate, ± spreading, 1 mm in diameter, sometimes ±curved, internodes 1-2(-3) cm × ca. 1 mm. Leaves opposite, 1.5-3.5 mm, connate for 1/3-2/3 their length, free part shortly triangular, apex blunt or pointed. Pollen cones 2 or 3, obovoid, sessile or subsessile at nodes, rarely solitary at apex of branchlets, 3-4 × 2-4 mm; bracts in 2 or 3(-4?) pairs, connate for ca. 1/2 their length; staminal column ca. 2 mm, exserted, with 6-8 sessile anthers. Seed cones solitary or opposite at nodes, sessile or shortly pedunculate, ovoid to oblong-ovoid at maturity, 6-9 × 5-8 mm; bracts in 2 or 3 pairs, apical pair connate for ca. 1/2 their length, red and fleshy at maturity; integument tube 1.5-2 mm, twisted, curved, or straight often in same plant. Seeds 1-2 brown seeds 3.5-6 × 2.5-3 mm. Pollination in June, seeds mature in July or August (Harkevich and Kachura 1981, Ali and Qaiser 1987, Fu et al. 1999). See also the description in Bobrov (1968).

Distribution and Ecology

China: Gansu, Hebei, Nei Mongol, Qinghai, Shanxi, Sichuan, Xinjiang, Xizang; Kazakhstan; Mongolia; Pakistan (one collection in the Karakoram); Russia: southern Siberia, endangered in Ussuriland. In China at 1400-4800 m; in Russia to sea level. Usually found on sandy soils on river banks, on rocky slopes, or in dry places (Harkevich and Kachura 1981, Ali and Qaiser 1987, Fu et al. 1999).

Remarkable Specimens

No data as of 2023.03.03.

Ethnobotany

Observations

See the observations on iNaturalist, accessed 2021.12.30.

Remarks

Citations

Ali, S.I. and M. Qaiser (eds.). 1987. Flora of Pakistan. http://www.efloras.org.

Bobrov, E. G. 1968. Ephedraceae, pp. 154-160 in V.L. Komarov (ed.), Flora of the USSR, Vol. 1, trans. by the Israel Program for Scientific Translations. Washington DC: Smithsonian Institution and National Science Foundation. Available: Biodiversity Heritage Library, accessed 2021.12.30.

Meyer, C. A. 1846. Versuch einer Monographie der Gattung Ephedra, dirch Abbildung erlautert. Mémoires de l'Académie impériale des sciences de St.-Pétersbourg, Sér. 6, Sci. Math., Seconde Pt. Sci. Nat. 5:89. Available: Biodiversity Heritage Library, accessed 2021.12.31.

Harkevich, S. and N. Kachura. 1981. Rare Plant Species of The Soviet Far East and Their Conservation. Nauka, Moscow (in Russian).

See also

Species profile at Plants of the World Online, accessed 2021.12.30.