Castilleja : the newsletter of the Wyoming Native Plant Society

Posted at www.uwyo.edu/wyndd/wnps/wnps_home.htm

In this issue:

2010 Meeting Highlights 3

Physaria \x\ Wyoming: Part 1. Plant

Taxonomy in Action 4

A Look at Land-Based Botany in Wyoming. . 6
Gold Standards of the Plant Kingdom 7

Prehistorically Correct Menus

By Richard Adams and Rhoda Schantz

{Editor's note: The following is excerpted from "Nuts
and Roots: the staples of prehistoric cuisine in the
Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, "which appeared in
Reflections, the annual journal of the College of
Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of
Wyoming; posted at: http://multimedia.uwyo.edu/
UWAG_STREAM/Reflections201 0/index.htmt ) .

The archeology of prehistoric hunters in
Wyoming is well-known thanks to the work of
George Prison (University of Wyoming), but he says
that survival would not have been possible if
gathered food products had been subtracted from
the diet of prehistoric hunters-gatherers.
Anthropology doctoral candidate Richard Adams is
studying the gathering part of the hunter-gatherer
equation of prehistoric people in the Greater
Yellowstone Ecosystem, shedding new light on the
prehistoric significance of plants in the diet.

Curious about the nutrient value of
gathered foods, Adams approached Family and
Consumer Sciences Associate Professor Rhoda
Schantz. Her research interests were piqued by a
desire to be informed about Wyoming foods.

Shantz and Adams chose to focus on a few
gathered nuts and roots that, because of first-hand
accounts by Euro-American eyewitnesses, were
suspected of being dietary staples: whitebark pine
nuts {Pinus albicaulis), biscuitroots {Lomatiums\i\i.,
Cymopterusstit^.), and sego lilies {Cabchortus

Above: Sego lily {Cabchortus nuttaiiii). Eronr. Britton,
N.L., and A. Brown. 1913. An Illustrated Ebra of the
Northern United States, Canada and the British
Possessions. Vol. 1: 508. Courtesy of Kentucky Native
Plant Society. Insert: Sego lily bulbs, by Richard Adams.

spp.). Pine nuts were known to be the winter
staple in prehistoric diets of other Shoshone
Indians who lived in California and Nevada.
Meriwether Lewis described the first specimens of
biscuitroots and their importance to Shoshone and
Flathead Indians. They are some of the first plants
to grow in the spring, and they can be harvested
by the bushel in good years. The harvest season in
Wyoming begins with the first biscuitroot appearing
before the snow has completely melted in mid-
March and lasts until mid-October when the last of
the pine nuts are collected. (Continued, p. 7)

WNPS News

CastiHeia - at Your Fingertips : All issues of
CastiHeja qo\nq back to Volume 1 in 1981 are now
available online at the Wyoming Native Plant
Society homepage (www.uwyo.edu/wyndd/wnps/),
along with a partial index of articles (1981-2000).
Scanning of early issues was kindly provided by
Walter Fertig. Printed copies are also archived in
the University of Wyoming (Laramie) and the
Draper Museum, part of the Buffalo Bill Museum
(Cody), in addition to the Society set of newsletters
kept by the editor.

New Members : Please welcome the following new
members to WNPS: Bob Means, Cheyenne; Jennifer
Walker, Buffalo; and Brianna Wright, Laramie.

Call for Candidates : A 2010 nomination committee
will be established to fill WNPS positions.
Interested? Contact Lynn Moore.

Treasurer's Report : Balance as of 24 Sept -
Scholarship = $1,617.50; General = $2,130.62;
Total = $3,748.12

2011 Markow Scholarship announcement : Online
soon and in the next issue.

Please RENEW ! If "2009" is printed after your
name on the mailing label, your membership is not
current. Membership follows the calendar year but
retro- and advance-renewals are welcome all year!
Contact Ann Boelter if you have any questions.

Contributors to this Issue : Richard Adams, Ann
Boelter, Janet Britt, Cass D'Alaija, Bonnie Heidel,
Robert Means, Steve O'Kane, Daniel Schlaepfer,
Larry Schmidt, and Rhoda Schantz.

Wyoming Native Plant Society
P.O. Box 2500
Laramie, WY 82073

WNPS Board - 2010

President: Lynn Moore (lmflora@alluretech.net)
Vice-President: Brian Elliott

(brianelliott.eec@gmail.com)

Sec.-Treasurer: Ann Boelter (amb749@yahoo.com)
Board-at-large:

Linda Dudinyak C09-'10) (ldudinyak@hotmail.com)
Eve Warren ClO-'ll)

(apacherian_savanna@yahoo.com)

Newsletter Editor: Bonnie Heidel
(bheidel@uwyo.edu)

Webmaster: Melanie Arnett (arnett@uwyo.edu)
Teton Chapter: PO Box 6654, Jackson, WY 83002
(Amy Taylor, Treasurer)

Bighorn Native Plant Society: P.O. Box 21,

Big Horn, WY 82833 (Jean Daly, Treasurer

Vegetation/Climate Change Workshop

The University of Wyoming will be hosting a workshop on November 19^^ in Laramie, entitled "Living
on the Edge: Integrating Science into the Management of Range-Margin Species." The workshop is
sponsored by the Wyoming Bureau of Land Management and the Wyoming Chapters of the Society of
American Foresters.

This is a one day workshop focusing on the ecology and climatic conditions that control species
ranges, climatic modeling and the integration of science into management decisions. Lands in Wyoming
include multiple species that are at the edge of their range. Both the changing climate and our
management decisions will play an important role in future of these species.

The case study presented in this workshop to illustrate the range-margin species is that of
ponderosa pine expansion in the Big Horn Basin. It is based on the work of University of Wyoming Ph. D.
candidate Mark Lesser from the Botany Department.

There is no cost to attend this workshop, but registration is required. To register and for further
information, please go to the workshop website at https://sites.google.com/site/rangemarginworkshop/.

RM

2010 Meeting Highlights

Prolific flowering greeted WNPS members at the 2010
Wyoming Native Plant Society Annual Meeting, 18-20 June
3 whirlwind exploration of Belvoir Ranch, owned by the
'■ i I City of Cheyenne and the Big Hole rim, under easement by

The Nature Conservancy. We were joined by the Wyoming
Chapter of The Nature Conservancy, and privileged to be one of the biggest groups to visit. It was preceded
by a serene evening hike at Vedauwoo, and followed by a potiuck gathering, and a peek at the "control
panels" of the prairie ecosystem at the USDA High Plains Research Center the next day. The event also
marked the first time we have held our annual meeting in Laramie County! A huge thanks to all!

(Plant photos - upper left and clockwise):

Townsendia grandiflora, by Daniel Schlaepfer

Zigadenus venosus, by Daniel Schlaepfer

Scutellaria brittonii, by Janet Britt

CastiHeja sessiliflora, by Daniel Schlaepfer

WNPS people at Belvoir Ranch (above, below), by Ann Boelter

The running checklist of plants observed at Belvoir Ranch is now posted on the
WNPS homepage. The list and many photos have also been provided to the City.

3

Physaria species of Wyoming:

Part 1. Plant Taxonomy in Action

By Bonnie Heidel^ and Steve L. O'Kane,

Plant taxonomy is product and process, as
epitomized in the recent Flora of North America
(FNA) treatment of Physaria (Brassicaceae; O'Kane
2010). It may seem that every action verb in the
taxonomic lexicon was enlisted, resulting in a
reference looking unfamiliar to users of Dorn
( 2001 ).

Central to the new FNA treatment is the
merging of most of the species of the genus
Lesquereiia (bladderpods) into a much enlarged
Physaria (the double-bladderpods, or twinpods),
transferring all Wyoming species (see Dorn 2001)
and most of the rest of the North American species
of Lesquereiia to Physaria. Molecular data show
that the smaller genus Physaria is nested within
and evolved more than once from the larger
Lesquereiia {k\-S\\e\\bdiZ and O'Kane 2002, Bailey et
ai. 2006). Furthermore, as stated by Al-Shehbaz
and O'Kane (2002 ), '' Lesquereiia dwb Physaria dive
indistinguishable in basically every morphological
aspect, including leaf morphology trichome type,
inflorescence, flower color, fruiting pedicels, and all
aspects of seed-coat sculpture and embryo type."

In fact, the only morphological feature separating
the two traditionally-recognized genera, in
Wyoming, but not elsewhere, is the doubly inflated
fruits of Physaria in the traditional sense.

Evolutionary origins and the much larger
size of Lesquereiia yNQu\(\ have presupposed a
merger of Physaria into Lesquereiia, as proposed
by O'Kane etai. (1999) to the Committee for
Spermatophyta (a permanent committee set up to
implement the International Code of Botanical
Nomenclature). However, the proposal was
rejected so the older of the two genus names,
Physaria, took priority. Unfortunately for all users,
this necessitated a massive transfer of species
names from Lesquereiia to Physaria.

Interestingly, in years past both Lesquereiia
and Physaria were once included in the unrelated
Old World genus Vesicaria. In 1848, Asa Gray

^ Wyoming Natural Diversity Database, University of Wyoming,

Dept 3381, 1000 E. University Ave., Laramie, WY 82071
^ Department of Biology, University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, lA
50614-0421

raised the rank of the New World double-fruited
species of Physaria frora a section within Vesicaria
to a separate genus. In 1888, Sereno Watson
created the genus Lesquereiia tor species of
Vesicaria with uninflated, non-double fruits and
transferred most of the remaining New World
species to Lesquereiia {roforeoces in Rollins 1993).

The first monograph of Lesquereiia by
Edwin Payson, a University of Wyoming graduate,
who wrote his eloquent monograph while on a
fellowship at the Missouri Botanical Garden (Payson
1922). He was the first to articulate parallels and
recognized "bridges" between Lesquereiia and
Physaria. The second, equally monumental
monograph to wrestle with the large and difficult
genus Lesquereiia by Reed Rollins, Harvard
University botanist who hailed from Lyman,
Wyoming (Rollins and Shaw 1973). Earlier Rollins
(1950) had noted: "The evidence now assembled
shows a continuous morphological gradation from
the genus Physaria Xoto Lesquereiia." Rollins
(1993) in his magnum opus. The Brassicaceae of
North America, further addressed the genus pair,
culminating years of earlier work (Rollins 1939a, b).

If Aven Nelson were inspecting the recent
FNA treatment of Physaria, would he recognize the
outcome? He most certainly would, for
taxonomists never obliterate the work of others,
but immortalize and build upon it. The Physaria
species he described are unchanged. One of the
Lesquereiia species he described, subsumed under
the name Lesquereiia aipina (Nutt.) Wats., is split
out and reinstated by O'Kane (2010). Nelson was
mentor to Edwin Payson, and inspiration to Reed
Rollins, who heard him speaking when Rollins was
a boy. Moreover, Nelson was a proponent of
logical taxonomic rules and processes, and was
among the first American authors to publish a flora
(Coulter and Nelson 1909) in keeping with the
revisionary "Vienna" International Code of Botanical
Nomenclature of 1905.

An overview of the Physaria treatment in
FNA (O'Kane 2010) Is easier for contemporary
Wyoming botanists to understand when compared
directly to Dorn's (2001) treatment in the state
flora. Table 1 presents a side-by-side comparison
of the two treatments. Of the Physaria species
named for eminent botanists in the current
treatment, we can all take pride that Wyoming
botanists are well-represented: Physaria dornii, P.
neisonii, P. carinata subsp. paysonii, and P.

4

reediana (applying the first nanne of Reed Rollins
because his surname had already been applied in
naming another species). Thus brings to an end a
taxonomic conundrum, and a new chapter in the
Physaria saga.

A second article will follow with a key to all
of the Physaria in Wyoming - stay tuned!

References Cited

Al-Shehbaz, I. A. and S.L. O’Kane, Jr. 2002. Lesquerella \s
united with Physaria. Novon 12: 319-329.

Bailey, CD, M.A. Koch, M. Mayer, K. Mummenhoff, S.L O'Kane,
Jr, S.L Warwick, M.D. Windham and I.A. Al-Shehbaz.

2006. Toward a global phylogeny of the Brassicaceae.

Mol. Biol. Evol. 23: 2142-2160.

Coulter, J.M. and A. Nelson. 1909. New Manual of Botany of
the Central Rocky Mountains. American Book Company,
New York, NY.

Dorn, R.D. 2001. Vascular Plants of Wyoming, third edition.
Mountain West Publishing, Cheyenne, WY.

O'Kane, S.L. 2010. Physaria. In: Flora of North America
Editorial Committee. Flora of North America North of
Mexico. Volume 7. Salicaceae to Brassicaceae. Oxford
Univ. Press, New York. pp. 616-665.

O'Kane, S.L., I.A. Al-Shehbaz and N.J. Turland. 1999. Proposal
to conserve the name Lesquerella against Physaria
(Cruciferace). Taxon 48: 163-164.

Payson, E.B, 1922. A monograph of the genus Lesquerella.

Ann. Missouri Bot. Gard. 8:108-236.

Rollins, R. C. 1993. The Cruciferae of Continental North
America: Systematics of the Mustard Family from the
Arctic to Panama. Stanford Univ. Press.

Rollins, R.C. 1950. Studies on some North American Cruciferae.
Contr. Gray Herb. 171:42-53.

Rollins, R.C. 1939a. The cruciferous genus Physaria. Rhodora
41: 391-414.

Rollins, R.C. 1939b. Studies in the genus Lesquerella. Am.

Jour. Bot. 26: 419-421.

Rollins, R.C. and E.A. Shaw. 1973. The Genus Lesquerella
(Cruciferae) in North America. Harvard University Press,
Cambridge, MA.

Table 1. Comparison of the Lesquerella dindi /y7/5«^/7a nomenclature in Dorn (2001) with that of O'Kane (2010)

Dorn (2001)

O'Kane (2010)

Change

Not present

Physaria pachyphylla

Newly described from the Pryor Mtns area of Montana (and Wyoming")

Lesquerella alpha

Transferred to Physaria and split into the four species below

Physaria curvipes

Reinstatement and transfer of Lesquerella curvipes Xq Physaria

Physaria reediana

Reinstatement, transfer to Physaria and renaming of Lesquerella
alpinavax. laevis\L. condensata var. laevis^

Physaria spa tu lata

Reinstatement and transfer of Lesquerella spatuiata to Physaria

Physaria subumbellata

Reinstatement and transfer of Lesquerella subumbellata to Physaria

Lesquerella arenosa var.
arenosa

Physaria arenosa ssp.
arenosa

Transferred to Physaria ar\^ rank changed from var. to ssp.

Lesquerella arenosa var.
arqiHosa

Physaria arenosa ssp.
arqiHosa

Transferred to Physaria and rank changed from var. to ssp.

Lesquerella carinata

Physaria carinata ssp.
carinata

Transferred to Physaria ar\6 combined with Lesquerella carinata var.
lanquida at the rank of ssp.

Lesquerella condensata

Physaria nelsonii

Reinstatement, transfer to Physaria , and renaming of Lesquerella
condensata \ L. alpinavar. condensata\

Lesquerella fremontii

Physaria fremontii

Transferred to Physaria

Lesquerella ludoviciana

Physaria ludoviciana

Transferred to Physaria

Lesquerella macrocarpa

Physaria macrocarpa

Transferred to Physaria

Lesquerella montana

Physaria montana

Transferred to Physaria

Lesquerella mult/ceps

Physaria mutticeps

Transferred to Physaria

Lesquerella parvula

Physaria parvuia

Transferred to Physaria

Lesquerella paysonii

Physaria carinata ssp.
paysonii

Transferred to Physaria and rank changed from species to ssp.

Lesquerella prostrata

Physaria prostrate

Transferred to Physaria

Physaria acutifoHa

Physaria acutifoHa

None

Physaria brassicoides

Physaria brassicoides

None

Physaria conqesta

Physaria conqesta

None

Physaria didymocarpa [var.
didymocarpa\

Physaria didymocarpa ssp.
didymocarpa

Rank changed from var. to ssp.

Physaria dornii

Physaria dornii

None

Physaria eburnifJora

Physaria e bum if! ora

None

Physaria inteqrifoUa

Physaria inteqrifoUa

None

Physaria lanata

Physaria didymocarpa ssp.
lanata

Rank changed from species to ssp.

Physaria saximontana [var.
saximontana\

Physaria saximontana ssp.
saximontana

Rank changed from var. to ssp.

Physaria vituHfera

Not recognized as occurring
in Wyoming

Probably not existing in Wyoming and known only from Colorado

5

A Look at Land-Based Botany in Wyoming

By Cass D'Alaija

A national press release posted by the
Botanic Gardens Conservation International in
August 2010 unveiled a first-of-its-kind review
of the nation's capacity to maintain or expand
core botanical work essential for managing
land, teaching future generations, and
contributing to the overall future of scientific
discovery, human well-being, and sustainability
(posted at: www.bgci.org/usa/bcap). Fourteen
far-reaching recommendations arose from the
analyses.

How did it play out in Wyoming? It
didn't, so the Wyoming Native Plant Society
will reprint recommendations starting with
Recommendation 9: "The nation's five federal
land management agencies^* should increase
the number of trained, full-time botanists on
staff. At minimum, each agency should have
at least ... one full-time botanist with
appropriate training on staff at all regional,
state, and field offices." To determine where
Wyoming stands, we performed a rigorous
anaivsis of land-based botanv in the state.

Using the only dataset at our disposal,
the membership list, and minor assumptions
on interpreting this dataset^, we have
determined the average density of plant people
per office and per 10,000 mile^ affiliated with
land-managing agencies in Wyoming - see
Table 1. ...For good measure, we threw in
state land managing agencies collectively, and
also normalized results by determining density
of plant people.

By this analysis and set of assumptions,
less than half of the federal agencies in
Wyoming have achieved minimal numbers of
plant people per office. We have also
documented that agency plant people are rare
in Wyoming and the state has many square
miles of room for increases in its plant people
population . Clearly, we are justified in regarding
those members who work on public lands - and all
members - as priceless.

**If you are aware of any agency plant people who are
NOT members of Wyoming Native Plant Society, we would
love to toss results out the window. Please give them the
WNPS homepage link for membership information.

Table 1. Plant people within land-managing agencies of Wyoming

Agency

No. of people in land
agency + in Wyoming

Native Plant Society**

No. of primary land-
managing offices for WY

Mean no. of plant
people per office

Land area in
Wyoming (miles^)

Mean density of plant people
per 10,000 miles^ of public
land

BLM

7

11

0.6

28,711

2.4

USFS

9 (3 based in-state)

9

1.0

14,434

6.2 (2.1 in-state)

NPS

3

2

1.5

3,739

8

USFWS

0

0

0

145

0

DOD

0

1

0

9

0

State agencies

1

4 (separate agencies)

0.25

6,039

1.6

The five main federal land-managing agencies in the
U.S. include: Bureau of Land Management (BLM),
Department of Defense (DOD), National Park Service
(NPS), us Forest Service (USFS), and US Fish and
Wildlife Service (USFWS), which are collectively
responsible for managing nearly 1/3 of the nation's
landmass. (Federal plus state lands total 54.6% of
Wyoming landmass). Public land acreage are based on
1995 data compiled in all states by the National
Wilderness Institute

(http://www.nwi.org/Maps/LandChart.html ).

" Assumption l . We do not have a way to determine full
time botanist-equivalents, so we refer to our target as
"plant people" and assume that an employee probably
performs some form of plant work in their respective
land-managing agency position if they are interested
enough in plants to belong to Wyoming Native Plant
Society. The specific botany duties may be associated
with Botanist and Ecologist positions, as well as with
positions responsible for range, forestry, reclamation,
sensitive species, weeds, natural history interpretation,
soils, wildlife habitat, or else overseeing such work.
Assumption 2 . The author knows everyone on the
membership list who meets the Assumption 1 criterion.
Assumption 3 . Everyone meeting the Assumption 1
criterion is also current in renewing their WNPS
membership.

6

Gold Standards of the
Plant Kingdom Go Online

By Larry Schmidt, Associate Librarian

(Editor's note: The following article is excerpted from
"Andrew W. Mellon grant funds digitization of plant
collection, " which appeared in the Fall 2010 issue of
"Check it Out, "a newsletter for patrons of University of
Wyoming Libraries. )

University of Wyoming Libraries and the Rocky
Mountain Herbarium (RM) are participating in the Global
Plants Initiative (GPI) funded by the Andrew W. Mellon
Foundation. A grant of $126,000 supports the database
creation, digital imaging, file export, and quality control
for type specimens in the RM. These are plant
specimens cited in a publication in which a species,
subspecies or variety is described as new to science.

The GPI Partners (herbaria and museums) are in the
process of imaging all plant types (vascular plants,
bryophytes, algae, and fungi) worldwide.

The goal is to build a comprehensive research
tool that can be accessed online by students and the
scientific community. Given the fragility of many of the
specimens, this remote access to the digital versions
greatly facilitates the use of these materials by all.
University of Wyoming has free access to the site until
the project is complete - it will then be available by
subscription from JSTOR Plants (accessible at
http://plants.jstor.org).

A herbarium is analogous to a library, but
instead of books, it houses high quality, carefully
prepared plant specimens for scientific research. In
recent years, herbaria have been involved in the
creation of databases containing information on
specimen labels. This includes locality and habitat
where collected, collector, and date. Herbarium
collections are important to science as each specimen
contains a wealth of information from morphological and
anatomical features and their variation to DNA that can
be extracted and sequenced. A type specimen is
important to research as it serves as the basis of a
scientific name (Figure 1).

Prehistoricallv Correct Menus, continued, from p. 1

Starting late March and armed with a
prehistorically-correct digging stick made from a
65-cm length of juniper and whittled to a point at
one end and fitted with a T-shaped handle at the
other that is similar in appearance to museum
specimens, Adams dug root crops in the Laramie
Range and in the Shirley and Great Divide basins
keeping track of the harvest rate, or how many

UW Libraries and the RM are partners in this
digitization project. RM Curator Ron Hartman and RM
Manager Ernie Nelson provide expertise on the collection
and help determine nomenclatural citations. UW
Librarian Larry Schmidt oversees imaging and quality
control. The RM website (accessible at
www.rmh.uwyo.edu/index.php) is supported in
partnership by the UW Libraries' Systems Department
and former UW graduate student Ben Legler (University
of Washington - Burke Museum).

Figure 1. A scanned image of the type specimen for
Erythronium obtusatum, collected by Aven Nelson in
1899, later synonomized with E grandifiorum. (Image
courtesy of RM and UW Libraries).

Libraries have been in the organization,
archiving, and long-term storage of traditional print
materials for years. More recently they have been
building digital collections as well. We are looking
forward to further expanding our collections by providing
the University with our unique skills in the organization
and display of virtual collections.

roots can be dug in a given time. Multiplying
harvest rate by the caloric value of the harvested
food provides the return rate (kilocalories/hour).

But the caloric value of many prehistorically
gathered foods had not yet been determined. With
laboratory time donated by the Family and
Consumer Sciences, Schantz conducted proximate
analyses of whitebark pine nuts and root plants. In
a proximate analysis, (continued, p. 8)

7

Prehistoricallv Correct Menus, continued from p. 7.
the food value (calories) and composition
(carbohydrate, protein, ash, and moisture content)
of foods are determined. These values are the
building blocks of dietary analyses.

...After calculating several return rates, the
researchers combined their data with the return
rates of other edible species gleaned from
published sources and then averaged the sample.
...Preliminary results show the average return rate
for gathered vegetable foods in Wyoming is about
1,000 kcal/hour, which means that, in just one
eight-hour day in the summer, a prehistoric
gatherer could collect enough vegetable food to
feed four to six people. Schantz and Adams
determined if one gatherer focused only on the
most caloric and easily harvested foods, a woman
could accumulate enough surplus over the course
of a harvest season to feed a family of four for half
the year. The conclusion that prehistoric Shoshone
women could work for seven months... and then
feed their families for the next several months with
stored nuts and roots may seem startling to
modern Americans working long hours just to make
ends meet every month.

Wyoming Native Plant Society is a non-profit
organization established in 1981, dedicated to
encouraging the appreciation and conservation of
the native flora and plant communities of
Wyoming. The Society promotes education and
research on native plants of the state through its
newsletter, field trips, and annual student
scholarship award. Membership is open to
individuals, families, or organizations. To join or
renew, return this form to:

Wyoming Native Plant Society
P.O. Box 2500, Laramie, WY 82073

Name:

Address:

Email:

$7.50 Regular Membership

$15.00 Scholarship Supporting Member

($7.50 goes to the Markow Scholarship Fund)

Check one:

New member

Renewing member

Renewing members, check here if this is an address change,

Wyoming Native Plant Society
P.O. Box 2500
Laramie, WY 82073

8