Hop sage facts for kids
Quick facts for kids Hop sage |
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Grayia (plant)
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| Species: |
spinosa
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Grayia spinosa is a type of plant often called hop sage or spiny hop sage. It belongs to the Grayia group within the Amaranthaceae plant family. You can find this plant all over the Western United States, growing in many different desert and mountain areas.
Contents
What it Looks Like
Grayia spinosa is a small, bushy shrub that can grow from about 1 to 3 feet (30-100 cm) tall, sometimes even taller. It has many branches that can look a bit thorny.
Its stems are usually reddish-brown with white lines, and older bark turns dark gray. The side branches are stiff and have pointy, spiny ends. When the plant is growing, its branches are covered with small, flat or slightly curved leaves. These leaves are about 1 to 2.5 cm long and are green and oval-shaped, often with whitish tips.
How it Reproduces
Most Grayia spinosa plants are dioecious. This means that each plant has either only male flowers or only female flowers. It's rare to find a plant with both male and female flowers (called monoecious).
Male plants have small groups of flowers growing where the leaves meet the stem. Each male flower has 4 or 5 small parts called perianth lobes. It also has 4 or 5 stamens, which are the parts that make pollen.
Female plants have small clusters of female flowers. These flowers are surrounded by two joined leaf-like parts called bracteoles. Female flowers don't have a perianth. They have an ovary with two stigmas that stick out from the bracteoles.
Fruits and Seeds
When the plant makes fruit, the bracteoles around the female flower grow much larger. They become flat and wing-like, measuring about 7.5 to 14 mm long. These parts turn bright pink to red, yellowish-green, or whitish. This makes the hop sage one of the most colorful shrubs in its habitat during springtime.
The fruit itself, called a utricle, is brown and about 1.5 to 2 mm long. It has a loose outer layer. Inside, the seed is flat and lens-shaped, with a brown, bumpy outer coat. The tiny plant inside the seed (the embryo) is ring-shaped and surrounded by a lot of stored food.
The plant's chromosome number is 2n = 36.
In hot or dry areas, the hop sage often loses its leaves and flowers by summer. It then looks like a woody, gray bush. However, in some places, it stays green all year round.
Where it Grows
Grayia spinosa is found widely across the Western United States. It is native to states like Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Arizona, California, Nevada, and Utah.
You can find it growing in valleys and at the bottom of mountains, from about 1,600 to 7,900 feet (500 to 2400 meters) high. It prefers dry soils that are either alkaline (like baking soda) or slightly alkaline. It often grows in areas with other plants like sagebrush, shadscale, or creosote bush.
How it Got its Name
The Grayia spinosa plant was first described in 1838 by a scientist named William Jackson Hooker. He called it Chenopodium spinosum.
Later, in 1840, William Jackson Hooker and George Arnott Walker-Arnott decided it belonged in its own group, or genus, which they named Grayia. However, the name they first used, Grayia polygaloides, wasn't quite right according to naming rules.
Finally, in 1849, another scientist named Alfred Moquin-Tandon gave it the correct scientific name we use today: Grayia spinosa.
See also
In Spanish: Grayia spinosa para niños
