1.
Cassiope tetragona
(Linnaeus) D. Don, Edinburgh New Philos. J. 17: 158. 1834.
Arctic white heather
Andromeda
tetragona
Linnaeus, Sp. Pl. 1: 393. 1753
Stems
decumbent to erect, forming dense mats, hairy.
Leaves
closely imbricate, usually appressed to pair above, usually 4-ranked (decussate); blade narrowly triangular, dorsi-ventrally expanded marginally forming abaxial groove, 3-6 × 1-1.5 mm, margins thin, without curled hairs at leaf tips, surfaces with short, stiff pubescence.
Flowers:
sepals 2-3 mm, margins entire; petals connate to 2/3 their lengths, tips spreading to recurved, corolla white to yellowish, cylindric, 4-10 mm; stamens 2 mm.
Capsules
3-5 mm.
2
n
= 26.
Subspecies 2 (2 in the flora): n North America, Eurasia.
The Arctic plants of
Cassiope tetragona
all belong to subsp.
tetragona
, which is partially replaced by and partly sympatric with subsp.
saximontana
in northern Cordilleran areas of western Canada, Alaska, Montana, and Washington. The latter differs in pedicel length relative to leaf length and the length of the corolla.
Arctic white heather has traditionally been used by the Inuit for lighting fires. Some Inuit call it
itsutit
, meaning "fuel for the fire,"
plantiksutit
, or
qijuktaat,
meaning "wood fetched." The flowers are said to taste awful (I. Ootoova et al. 2001).
The subspecies of
Cassiope tetragona
can generally be distinguished by the characters in the following key. The ranges overlap in Alaska and Yukon, and some collections from this region may prove problematic to assign to either subspecies.
