''Allenrolfea occidentalis'', the iodine bush, is a low-lying

shrub A shrub or bush is a small to medium-sized perennial woody plant. Unlike herbaceous plants, shrubs have persistent woody stems above the ground. Shrubs can be either deciduous or evergreen. They are distinguished from trees by their multiple ...

of the

Southwestern United States The Southwestern United States, also known as the American Southwest or simply the Southwest, is a geographic and cultural list of regions of the United States, region of the United States that includes Arizona and New Mexico, along with adjacen ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

Idaho Idaho ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest and Mountain states, Mountain West subregions of the Western United States. It borders Montana and Wyoming to the east, Nevada and Utah to the south, and Washington (state), ...

, and northern

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

.Shultz, L.M.: 'eFloras 2008
''Allenrolfea occidentalis'' in Flora of North America
Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis, MO & Harvard University Herbaria, Cambridge, MA. It grows in sandy, often salty, distinctly alkaline soils, such as desert washes and saline dry lakebeds. It is a common

halophyte A halophyte is a salt-tolerant plant that grows in soil or waters of high salinity, coming into contact with saline water through its roots or by salt spray, such as in saline semi-deserts, mangrove swamps, marshes and sloughs, and seashores. ...

member of the alkali flat ecosystem.

Description

The knobby green stems are fleshy and appear jointed at the internodes between segments. Often the segments are so short they are nearly round. The leaves appear as flaky scales scattered across the surface of the stems. The genus was named for the English botanist

Robert Allen Rolfe Robert Allen Rolfe (1855, Wilford, Nottinghamshire – 1921, Richmond, London, Richmond, Surrey) was an English botanist specialising in the study of orchids. For a time he worked in the gardens at Welbeck Abbey. He entered Kew in 1879 and became ...

.Shultz, L.M.: 'eFloras 2008
''Allenrolfea'' in Flora of North America
Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis, MO & Harvard University Herbaria, Cambridge, MA. It grows up to tall. The seeds of iodinebush have been used as food in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

prehistory Prehistory, also called pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the first known use of stone tools by hominins million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use ...

.Rhode, David; Madsen, David B.; Jones, Kevin T. (2006
Antiquity of early Holocene small-seed consumption and processing at Danger Cave
''Antiquity'' 80(308):328-339

References

External links

Jepson Manual TreatmentUSDA Plants ProfilePhoto gallery
Amaranthaceae Halophytes Flora of the Southwestern United States Flora of Northwestern Mexico Flora of Idaho Flora of the Northwestern United States Flora of California Flora of the California desert regions Flora of the Sonoran Deserts Flora of the Great Basin Plants described in 1871 Taxa named by Sereno Watson Flora without expected TNC conservation status {{Amaranthaceae-stub

Description

References

Further reading

External links