Biorepository Data Portal

Wiggins 1964, FNA 2003, Kearney and Peebles 1969

Duration: Perennial Nativity: Native Lifeform: Vine General: Suffrutescent or shrubby, much branched perennial with long, weak, slender, pale reclining branches. Leaves: Opposite, scattered, glabrous 1.5-6 cm long, ovate to ovate-deltoid, typically cordate to truncate at base, attenuate at apex or sometimes acute, often apiculate. Flowers: Terminal inflorescence or axillary, flowers arranged in umbels on leafy or bracteate cymose branches; umbels 5-10 rayed, forked, rays lanceolate-attenuate, sparsely hairy, caducous; greenish perianth, rotate-spreading, 3-4 mm broad, stamens 2, much exserted. Fruits: Greenish anthocarp, narrowly clavate, finely ribbed, glabrous or occasionally finely hirsutulose, 10-12 mm long. Ecology: Found in canyons and thickets; 2,000-4,500 ft (610-1372 m); flowers September-April. Distribution: s AZ, NM, s TX; south to s MEX, and in S. Amer. Notes: A sometimes robust perennial with a shrubby habit, reaching from 1 to even 2 m tall; the leaves are opposite and trangular to heart shaped; inflorescences are of many delicate and greenish white flowers arising on stalks from the same point (umbel). Ethnobotany: Unknown Etymology: Boerhavia is for Hermann Boerhaave (1663-1738) a Dutch botanist, scandens means climbing. Synonyms: Commicarpus scandens Editor: SBuckley 2010, FSCoburn 2015