Cleomella multicaulis (Many-Stemmed Spider-Flower)
CLEOME MULTICAULIS DE CANDOLLE; PERITOMA MULTICAULIS (DE CANDOLLE) H.H. ILTIS; CLEOME SONORAE A. GRAY; PERITOMA SONORAE (A. GRAY) RYDBERG
| USFWS | State of NM | USFS | BLM | Navajo Nation | State Rank | Global Rank | NMRPTC Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| E | SH | G3 | R |
| Overall Conservation Status | Documented Threats | Actions Needed |
|---|---|---|
| WEAKLY CONSERVED | water management/use |
Continued searches to document from NM. |
Annual; stems slender, erect, up to 60 cm tall; leaves sessile or with short stalks, palmately compound, leaflets 3, elliptic, slender, folded, 2 mm wide or less; flowers in axils of stem leaves, petals pink or white, 4-7 mm long; pods elongate, up to 20 mm long and 4 mm wide; smooth, circular in cross section, with a narrow stalk-like base; pods bent abruptly downward at the juncture of the pod's narrow base and the pedicel. Flowers June to August.
The widespread and common Cleomella serrulata (Rocky Mountain bee-plant) has narrowly elliptic leaflets, 5-15 mm wide and flowers 8-13 mm long.
New Mexico, Grant and Hidalgo counties; Wyoming, south-central Colorado, southeastern Arizona, western Texas; Mexico (Chihuahua, Durango, Jalisco, Michoacán).
Wet, saline or alkaline soils; often in and around alkali sinks, arid-land springs and ciénegas, or old lake beds.
The slender spiderflower has not been seen in New Mexico since 1851 when two separate collections were made. One collection was made by George Thurber at Las Playas in Hidalgo County. The other collection was made by John Bigelow "near the Mimbres". The type specimens of Cleome sonorae have preprinted labels “C. WRIGHT, Coll. N. Mex. 1851.” without further annotation to actual location. The type collection date, however, places Charles Wright in current day Cochise County, AZ which was still in New Mexico Territory in 1851.
This is a rare, but widespread wetland species. There are several populations in south-central Colorado and in Wyoming where plants can be locally common. It is likely extirpated from New Mexico and possibly Arizona. A few observations have been made close to the U.S. border in Chihuahua and Sonora, which offer a glimmer of hope that it may still be in New Mexico. It was also documented as extant in 2003 in Presidio County, Texas (Poole et al. 2007).
Many wetlands in the southwest have been destroyed and the few remaining continue to be seriously threatened by various human uses. Continued searches are needed for this species in New Mexico.
Iltis, H. 1958. Studies in the Capparidaceae V. Capparideaceae of New Mexico. Southwestern Naturalist 3:133-144.
Iltis, H.H. 2007. Studies in Cleomaceae V: A new genus and ten new combinations for the Flora of North America. Novon: A Journal for Botanical Nomenclature 17(4):447-451.
*New Mexico Native Plants Protection Advisory Committee. 1984. A handbook of rare and endemic plants of New Mexico. University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.
Poole, J.M., W.R. Carr, D.M. Price and J.R. Singhurst. 2007. Rare plants of Texas: A field guide. W.L. Moody Jr. Natural History Series, number 37. Texas A&M University Press, College Station. 656 pp.
Roalson, E.H., Hall, J.C., Riser Ii, J.P., Cardinal-Mcteague, W.M., Cochrane, T.S. & Sytsma, K.J. 2015. A revision of generic boundaries and nomenclature in the North American cleomoid clade (Cleomaceae). Phytotaxa 205 (3): 129–144. https://doi.org/10.11646/phytotaxa.205.3.1
For distribution maps and more information, visit Natural Heritage New Mexico
