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SEA PURSLANE

Atriplex portulacoides

Goosefoot Family [Amaranthaceae]

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category
category8Shrubs
category
category8Deciduous
category
category8Broadleaf
status
statusZnative
flower
flower8cream
morph
morph8actino
petals
petalsZ5
type
typeZspiked
stem
stem8round
sex
sexZmonoecious

15th Aug 2016, Conway Estuary, North Wales. Photo: © RWD
A sprawling shrub which is well-branched and grows up to 1m in height (or length) in salty mud and sand usually near to pools or dykes and often flooded at high tide. Here growing adjacent to a Sea Lavender (purple, on the right nearer the mud-sands).


15th Aug 2016, Conway Estuary, North Wales. Photo: © RWD
The same clump, but this time in the sun. The fuzzy yellowish top are the flowers.


31st Aug 2018, shore-path embankment, Crosby beach, Sefton Coast. Photo: © RWD
It can't grow on wind-blown, shifting sands, so here it grows on a slightly raised embankment where it regularly gets sea-spray when the tide is in and the westerlys up. You can tell it gets windy here with all those wind turbines out to sea in Liverpool Bay.


3rd June 2010, Walney Island, Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
The leaves are greyish-green. Since most of the flowering spikes here are yellowish, your Author assumes that these are male plants, for it is monoecious, coming in male or female plants,


3rd June 2010, Walney Island, Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
Stems sprawling over the sloping cemented stones which hold the sea in Walney Channel back at Vickerstown, Walney Island.


3rd June 2010, Walney Island, Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
The male flowers are tiny and yellow(ish) and in a short thin spike.


3rd June 2010, Walney Island, Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria. Photo: © RWD
  The salty location of most of the plants means that they are usually washed by the sea at high tide. You can just about discern the yellow anthers of the tiny male flowers.


1st Aug 2013, shore-path, Crosby beach, Sefton Coast Photo: © RWD
  This species of Atriplex, being also a perennial, has the lower leaves opposite and shaped oblong to elliptic, with a gradually tapering base.


1st Aug 2013, shore-path, Crosby beach, Sefton Coast Photo: © RWD
  the plant is much branched. The flowers here are in short clusters. The yellow anthers poke out a tiny bit.


1st Aug 2013, shore-path, Crosby beach, Sefton Coast Photo: © RWD
  With a green insect, perhaps a Common Green Capsid (Lygocoris pabulinus) ? in the centre.


23rd Aug 2011, Lytham, Lancashire Coast. Photo: © RWD
  This specimen has obviously been washed by the tide for it has green strands of a seaweed wrapped around it. The male flowers usually have 5 white filaments with yellow anthers at the top.


23rd Aug 2011, Lytham, Lancashire Coast. Photo: © RWD
  The flower at the top with 5 anthers is also showing its five half-splayed-out tepals. The other male flowers have not yet opened; they have 5 closed tepals. The red flower just below it may well be a female flower showing but one red style.


15th Aug 2016, Conway Estuary, North Wales. Photo: © RWD
  The anthers in close-up. Note the puckered surface of the tepals.


15th Aug 2016, Conway Estuary, North Wales. Photo: © RWD
  The white filaments have grown quite long in this specimen. Maybe they are more mature?


10th Sept 2015, Hilbre Island, West Kirby, Wirral. Photo: © RWD
  The female plants have just 2 short diverging red styles poking out. some have turned brown.


25th Aug 2015, rocky beach, Morecambe, Lancs. Photo: © RWD
  Two hairy, red, short and stubby styles poke out from one of the female flowers. The 5-lobed object at the bottom may be a fruit (?)


10th Sept 2015, Hilbre Island, West Kirby, Wirral. Photo: © RWD
 


10th Sept 2015, Hilbre Island, West Kirby, Wirral. Photo: © RWD
  Your Author can only guess that the one on the left is perhaps the fruit(?)


10th Sept 2015, Hilbre Island, West Kirby, Wirral. Photo: © RWD
The back-lit leaves.


10th Sept 2015, Hilbre Island, West Kirby, Wirral. Photo: © RWD
The leaves are greyish-green and mealy, with only a faint midrib discernible.


10th Sept 2015, Hilbre Island, West Kirby, Wirral. Photo: © RWD
The greyishness comes not fron short white hairs, but from the numerous tiny pits and puck marks in the surface.


Not to be semantically confused with : Pedunculate Sea-purslane (Atriplex pedunculata - formerly Halimione pedunculata) [a plant with similar name which is a very rare [RRR] amd not found elsewhere apart in bare places in the saltmarshes of East Kent to North Lincolnshire, and which grows to only 30cm high, and has Y-bar fruits on very long stalks]

Uniquely identifiable characteristics

Distinguishing Feature :

A sprawling shrub which is well-branched and grows up to 1m in height (or length) in salty mud and sand usually near to pools or dykes and often flooded at high tide. It is found on the coasts of the British Isles clockwise from Berwick-upon-tweed to Stranraer. Hardly found north of any of those two points. Also mostly on the west coast of Ireland from Belfast to Cork, with less between that and Galway.


  Atriplex portulacoides  ⇐ Global Aspect ⇒ Amaranthaceae  

Distribution
 family8Goosefoot family8Amaranthaceae
 BSBI maps
genus8Atriplex
Atriplex
(Oraches)

SEA PURSLANE

Atriplex portulacoides

Goosefoot Family [Amaranthaceae]