Narrowleaf Spiderling (Boerhavia linearifolia)

   
 

Narrowleaf Spiderling (Boerhavia linearifolia), Amistad, Texas. Photograph by Gertrud Konings.

• Common English Names: Narrowleaf Spiderling, Linear-leaf Spiderling
• Common Spanish Names: Mochis
• Scientific Name: Boerhavia linearifolia (beer-HAH-vee-uh lin-ee-air-rih-FO-lee-uh)
• Family: Nyctaginaceae (Four-o'clock Family)
• Geographic Range: Open calcareous soils or rock in desert scrub and arid grasslands in south-central New Mexico, Trans-Pecos and central Texas, and eastern Chihuahua to Coahuila and Durango.
• Description: Perennial herb, sometimes slightly woody at the base; stems are usually erect or ascending, sometimes decumbent, sparingly branched and often hirsute to glandular puberulent; leaves mostly on the lower two-thirds of plant, linear to lanceolate, rarely ovate, glabrous to sparsely hispid or glandular pubescent and sometimes punctate, usually paler below than above; branches of inflorescence few but strongly ascending, terminating in loose, 1 to few flowered cymose clusters of purplish-pink, relatively large, somewhat showy, widely funnelform flowers with well exserted stamens.
• Notes: This species is without sticky, viscid bands between stem nodes of the inflorescence.

Last Update: 7 Oct 2013