notes Using the current Jepson key, this goes to Eriastrum pluriflorum ssp. sherman-hoytiae. One needs to know (at couplet 6 in that key) that the stamens are attached just below corolla sinus, where the color changes from the purplish-blue tube to the whitish throat). Note also the presence of the 'wiggle-room' qualifiers at couplet 7: ''Pl gen dense, occ cespitose''. Gen(erally) and occ(asionally) imply 'not always'. Indeed here the plant is neither dense or cespitose.
Also I believe the 'lvs linear' character in couplet 7' refers to the *width*, and is not meant to imply the margins must be entire (some are 4-lobed in this plant).
So, with the proper interpretation of the key and descriptions, the ID here actually comes out quite nicely in this new (revised) Jepson key. Having said all that, I must admit that I wasn't completely clear on all this until assisted by comments from Eriastrum maestro David Gowen :-)
Postscript 3/14/19: New name E. pluriflorum ssp. albifaux...though not yet incorporated in the Jepson eFlora. Today David informed me plants like these on the east base of the southern Sierra got a new name in the paper:
- De Groot, Sarah J. (2016). Tomus Nominum Eriastri: The Nomenclature and Taxonomy of Eriastrum (Polemoniaceae: Loeselieae). Aliso 34(2):25-152
(Available here...a remarkably detailed, informative, and masterfully scholarly work!)
Therein the taxon previously treated as E. pluriflorum ssp. sherman-hoytiae is split into two subspecies. The plants of the transmontane southern Sierra and points east with corolla 'tube+throat < 2 x lobes' and throat white are now circumscribed as E. pluriflorum ssp. albifaux (see pp. 107-1011). The members of the former subspecies sherman-hoytiae around Edwards Air Force Base (and also the San Joaquin Valley) with 'tube+throat ≥ 2 x lobes' and throat white to yellow retain that name.
