Velvety wild buckwheat

Shrubs, 5-10 × 8-15(-20) dm. Leaves cauline 1/ 2 or more length of flowering stem; petiole 0.5-1.5 cm; blade elliptic-oblong to oblong or ovate, rarely cordate, 1.5-3(-3.5) × (1-)1.5-2.5(-3.5) cm, densely white-tomentose abaxially, densely white- to tan-lanate or less so to brownish-floccose adaxially. Inflorescences rather open, 3-10 cm; branches densely tomentose. Involucres 2-3.5 × 1.5-2.5 mm. Flowers 2-2.5(-3) mm; perianth white to cream, glabrous.

Flowering Aug-Oct. Sandy to gravelly or clayey flats, washes, and slopes, mixed grassland, saltbush, and sagebrush communities, pinyon-juniper woodlands; 1200-2300 m; Ariz., Colo., N.Mex., Texas, Utah.

Variety velutinum is the principal expression of the species in the southeastern portion of the species' range in northeastern Arizona (Apache County), western Colorado (Mesa, Montezuma, Montrose, and San Miguel counties), northwestern New Mexico (Quay, Rio Arriba, Sandoval, San Juan, Santa Fe, and Socorro counties), and in southeastern Utah (Garfield, Grand, Kane, San Juan, and Wayne counties). The Texas location remains to be confirmed by modern collections. This variety is not always distinct from var. orbiculatum in southwestern Colorado and adjacent southeastern Utah. Plants with cordate leaf blades from Gypsum Valley in San Miguel County, Colorado, assigned here to var. orbiculatum, are particularly difficult to place. Variety velutinum is currently being introduced into cultivation.