Snake Range Buckwheat

Eriogonum holmgrenii is closely related to E. gracilipes, and like that species it occurs with Great Basin bristlecone pine (Pinus longaeva D. K. Bailey). It is restricted to the Snake Range in White Pine County, and is regarded as a “sensitive” species by the U.S. Forest Service and the state of Nevada. The species is occasionally seen in cultivation.

Herbs, matted, scapose, 0.1-0.5 × 0.5-3 dm, glandular-hairy, greenish. Stems matted, with persistent leaf bases, up to 5 height of plant; caudex stems matted; aerial flowering stems scapelike, erect, slender, solid, not fistulose, 0.03-0.3 dm, glandular-hairy.  Leaves basal, fasciculate in terminal tufts; petiole (0.1-)0.2-0.6(-1) cm, floccose and glandular; blade oblanceolate to spatulate, 0.2-0.5(-1) × (0.1-)0.2-0.4 cm, glandular and densely white-tomentose abaxially, less so to floccose and greenish adaxially, margins plane.  Inflorescences capitate, 0.6-0.9(-1) cm; branches absent; bracts 4-6, scalelike, narrowly lanceolate, 0.8-1.4(-1.8) mm. Peduncles absent. Involucres 2-4 per cluster, campanulate, (1.5-)2-3 × 2-3 mm, membranous, sparsely glandular-puberulent; teeth 5, erect to spreading, 1-1.3 mm. Flowers 2.5-3(-3.5) mm; perianth white to rose, sparsely glandular; tepals connate proximal 1/ 4, monomorphic, spatulate to obovate; stamens exserted, 2.5-3(-3.5) mm; filaments pilose proximally. Achenes light brown, 2.5-3 mm, glabrous except for slightly roughened beak.

Nev.

Flowering Jul-Sep.

Quartzite or limestone outcrops, slopes, and ridge tops, high-elevation sagebrush communities, alpine conifer woodlands; of conservation concern; 3200-3600m.