对枝菜 dui zhi cai

Herbs 6-20 cm tall. Stems pubescent with stellate subsessile trichomes sometimes mixed basally with much coarser, long-stalked subdendritic ones to 3 mm. Petiole of middle leaves 0.5-1.5 cm; leaf blade ovate to oblong-ovate, 2-5(-8) × 1-2(-3) cm, uniformly pubescent with subsessile stellate trichomes, base cuneate, margin sinuate-dentate, dentate, or repand, apex obtuse. Fruiting pedicels 1.5-2.5(-3) mm, stout. Sepals 4-5 × 0.5-0.8 mm. Petals white or purple, 7-10 × ca. 1 mm; claw 4-5 mm. Filaments 2-4 mm; anthers 0.9-1.2 mm. Ovules (14-)18-24 per ovary. Fruit linear, (3-)3.5-4.5(-5) cm × 3-5(-6) mm; valves with subsessile stellate trichomes mixed with coarser, subdendritic ones on stalks (0.5-)0.7-1.7(-2) mm, strongly torulose; gynophore obsolete; style 2-5 mm. Seeds orbicular to ovate-orbicular, 3.5-5 mm in diam., wing 0.5-0.7(-1) mm. Fl. Mar-May, fr. May-Jul.

Sandy areas, deserts. Gansu, Xinjiang [Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan].

This is the first record of Cithareloma from China, based on Team F-357 (PE), from Gansu, and Anonymous 79-249 (PE) and Team M-55 (PE), from Xinjiang. The species was misidentified as Matthiola stoddartii Bunge in FRPS and Fl. Xinjiang. (2(2): 164. 1995). The latter species is distributed from Afghanistan N into C Kazakhstan.