Menodora spinescens

{{Short description|Species of flowering plant}}

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|name = Spiny menodora

|image = Menodora spinescens close.jpg

|genus = Menodora

|species = spinescens

|authority = A.Gray

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Menodora spinescens is a species of flowering plant in the olive family known by the common name spiny menodora. It is native to the southwestern United States, where it grows in varied mountain, canyon, and desert habitat in California, Nevada, Utah and Arizona.[http://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/cgi-bin/get_JM_treatment.pl?5249,5257,5260 Jepson Manual Treatment][http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=MESP2 USDA Plants Profile][http://bonap.net/MapGallery/County/Menodora%20spinescens.png Biota of North America Program, Menodora spinescens]

Menodora spinescens is a shrub producing upright stems up to 90 centimeters tall, branching densely to form a thicket, the smallest branches tipped with spines. It is coated sparsely in short hairs. The fleshy green leaves are oblong or oval in shape, up to a centimeter long, and mostly borne in clusters. The inflorescence is a cluster of tube-throated flowers growing in axils, in splits between leaf clusters. The flowers are pink in bud and mostly white in bloom. The fruit is a capsule.[https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/3068569#page/394/mode/1up Gray, Asa. 1868. Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences 7: 388 Menodora spinescens]Hickman, J. C. 1993. The Jepson Manual: Higher Plants of California 1–1400. University of California Press, Berkeley.Cronquist, A.J., N. H. Holmgren & P. K. Holmgren. 1997. Vascular plants of the intermountain west, U.S.A., subclass Rosidae (except Fabales). 3A: 1–446. In A.J. Cronquist, A. H. Holmgren, N. H. Holmgren, J. L. Reveal & P. K. Holmgren (eds.) Intermountain Flora, Hafner Pub. Co., New York.