Gilman's Buckwheat

Eriogonum gilmanii is a rare, localized species. It is known from the Cottonwood, Last Chance, and Panamint mountains of Inyo County.

Herbs, cespitose or pulvinate, occasionally scapose, 0.1-0.5 × 1-3 dm, tomentose. Stems spreading, with persistent leaf bases, up to 1/ 5 height of plant; caudex stems matted; aerial flowering stems scapelike, spreading to erect, slender, solid, not fistulose, 0.1-0.2 dm, tomentose.  Leaves basal, 1 per node; petiole 0.2-0.5 cm, tomentose; blade elliptic, 0.2-0.4 × 0.1-0.2 cm, tomentose, margins plane. Inflorescences cymose-umbellate or capitate, (0.4-)0.8-1.5 × 0.5-1.5 cm; branches umbellate, tomentose; bracts 3, scalelike, triangular to linear-lanceolate, 1-5 mm. Peduncles spreading, 0.1-0.3(-0.5) cm, tomentose. Involucres 1 per node, turbinate, 1.5-2 × 1-1.5 mm, tomentose; teeth 5, erect, 0.4-0.7 mm. Flowers 3.5-5 mm; perianth yellowish, with reddish spot, glabrous; tepals connate proximally, dimorphic, those of outer whorl orbiculate and globose, 3-4 × 3-4 mm, those of inner whorl oblanceolate, 3.5-5 × 1-1.5 mm; stamens exserted, 3-4 mm; filaments pubescent proximally. Achenes brown, 2.5-3 mm, glabrous.

Calif.

Flowering May-Sep.

Limestone gravelly to rocky slopes and ridges, sagebrush communities, pinyon-juniper woodlands; 1500-2000m.

Eriogonum gilmanii is a species of wild buckwheat known by the common name Gilman's buckwheat. This plant is endemic to Inyo County, California, where it is known only from the desert mountain slopes of the Cottonwood, Last Chance, and Panamint Ranges. This is a flat mat-forming, woody perennial herb which grows in patches under 20 centimeters wide on rocky soils. Its tiny fleshy leaves, each under half a centimeter wide, are covered in a dense hairy white wool. The plant blooms in showy erect heads of small, inflated flowers, each a few millimeters wide and yellowish or orange with red stripes.