{"id":216,"date":"2024-05-01T14:21:50","date_gmt":"2024-05-01T21:21:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/?p=216"},"modified":"2025-05-01T11:50:13","modified_gmt":"2025-05-01T18:50:13","slug":"klickitat-biscuitroot-lomatium-klickitatense","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/2024\/05\/01\/klickitat-biscuitroot-lomatium-klickitatense\/","title":{"rendered":"Klickitat biscuitroot (Lomatium klickitatense)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Sometimes insects make pretty good taxonomists.&nbsp; At least that is what entomologist Wayne Whaley discovered when examining the favorite host plants of Indra swallowtail butterfly caterpillars.&nbsp; Across the western US, Whaley observed <em>Papilo indra<\/em> caterpillars feeding on some, but not all, populations of the widespread umbel species, Gray\u2019s biscuitroot (<em>Lomatium grayii<\/em>).&nbsp; Systematist Jason Alexander of the Jepson Herbarium undertook a detailed analysis of hundreds of specimens of <em>L. grayii<\/em> across its range and discovered consistent morphological differences that correlated with geography and the feeding habits of <em>Indra<\/em> caterpillars.&nbsp; A companion study also found consistent differences in the essential oils present in the foliage of these different populations.&nbsp; In 2018, Alexander, Whaley, and Natalie Blain published a paper splitting <em>L. grayii<\/em> into four species: <em>L. papilioniferum<\/em> (for the Indra butterfly) of the Pacific Northwest, <em>L. depauperatum<\/em> (endemic to Utah and Nevada), <em>L. grayii<\/em> proper (now restricted to SE Idaho, E Utah, Colorado, and Wyoming) and <em>L. klickitatense<\/em>, endemic to the Klickitat River drainage and vicinity in southern Washington and adjacent Oregon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp; &nbsp;Klickitat biscuitroot (<em>L. klickitatense<\/em>) differs from the more widespread <em>L. papilioniferum<\/em> in being much more robust (with leaves and stems up to 3 feet tall and wide) and having more finely divided leaves with long, narrow leaflets that are smooth, rather than rough (scabrous).&nbsp; It is locally abundant within its narrow range and easy to spot along the red cliffs on the Goldendale-Glenwood Highway and Highway 142 along the Klickitat River.&nbsp; Ironically, this species does not appear to have ever been collected by Wilhelm Suksdorf, Washington\u2019s preeminent pioneer botanist and longtime resident of nearby Bingen in the Columbia Gorge.&nbsp; Over a dozen collections of <em>L. klickitatense<\/em> were made in the 1960s and 1980s (including many by a WSU graduate student studying&nbsp; chemical properties of <em>Lomatium<\/em> species), but it remained undetected in the herbarium folders. What other unnamed species may be lurking in the cabinets?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u2013 Walter Fertig, collections manager, Marion Ownbey Herbarium.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/wpcdn.web.wsu.edu\/wp-cas\/uploads\/sites\/3476\/2025\/04\/lomatium-klickitatense_orig.jpg\" alt=\"Klickitat biscuitroot.\" class=\"wp-image-217\" width=\"533\" height=\"800\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wpcdn.web.wsu.edu\/wp-cas\/uploads\/sites\/3476\/2025\/04\/lomatium-klickitatense_orig.jpg 533w, https:\/\/wpcdn.web.wsu.edu\/wp-cas\/uploads\/sites\/3476\/2025\/04\/lomatium-klickitatense_orig-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/wpcdn.web.wsu.edu\/wp-cas\/uploads\/sites\/3476\/2025\/04\/lomatium-klickitatense_orig-100x150.jpg 100w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 533px) 100vw, 533px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sometimes insects make pretty good taxonomists.&nbsp; At least that is what entomologist Wayne Whaley discovered when examining the favorite host plants of Indra swallowtail butterfly caterpillars.&nbsp; Across the western US, Whaley observed Papilo indra caterpillars feeding on some, but not all, populations of the widespread umbel species, Gray\u2019s biscuitroot (Lomatium grayii).&nbsp; Systematist Jason Alexander of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":45,"featured_media":217,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"wsuwp_university_location":[],"wsuwp_university_org":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/45"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":224,"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216\/revisions\/224"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/217"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216"},{"taxonomy":"wsuwp_university_location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wsuwp_university_location?post=216"},{"taxonomy":"wsuwp_university_org","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sbs.wsu.edu\/ownbeyherbarium\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wsuwp_university_org?post=216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}