Single Record

Species: Physalis hederifolia [Physalis hederaefolia] [Physalis comata] [Physalis fendleri]

PhotoRecords: YES Rich Haswell: Saguache Co, Penitente Canyon 21 Nov 2022; 2 Dec 2022

Comments: Ivyleaf groundcherry has only one herbarium voucher from the Watershed: Terrace Reservoir, 24 Sept 1982 (Conejos Co). Forty years later, Physalis hederifolia was photorecorded from Penitente Canyon, 21 Nov 2022 (Saguache Co). This second observation was a plant beside a hiking trail, so possibly disseminated by human traffic (as may also have been the Terrace Reservoir plant). Some seven or eight other plants were observed within a fifteen-meter distance, all with fruits still hanging. The photorecord would add Saguache to counties indicated in Ackerfield (2022) and BONAP (2022). Note that Dixon (2012) finds P. hederifolia in the Watershed, in "disturbed places, valley floor," but so far with no supporting SEINet records. (His Adams State University herbarium vouchers may have not yet been entered into SEINet, and he may be referring to the Taos Plateau in New Mexico.) P. hederifolia is a USA Southwest and Plains groundcherry that has been found in Colorado counties both to the east and west of the Watershed, and in the Rio Grand drainage of New Mexico from the border with Colorado down to the border with Mexico, and on down through Texas to the Gulf of Mexico. Note that the distinction between P. hederifolia and P. fendleri is still not universally agreed upon. For instance BONAP (2022) synonymizes P. fendleri under P. hederifolia, while Ackerfield separates the two species and shows P. hederifolia nowhere west of the Front Range.