''Phoradendron macrophyllum'' is a species of flowering plant in the sandalwood family known by the common names Colorado Desert mistletoe, bigleaf mistletoe, and Christmas mistletoe. It is native to western United States and northern Mexico from Oregon to Colorado to Texas to Baja California, where it grows in many types of wooded habitat at elevations up to 1700 m (5500 feet). This

mistletoe Mistletoe is the common name for obligate hemiparasitic plants in the order Santalales. They are attached to their host tree or shrub by a structure called the haustorium, through which they extract water and nutrients from the host plant. ...

is a parasitic plant on a variety of trees and woody

shrub A shrub (often also called a bush) is a small-to-medium-sized perennial woody plant. Unlike herbaceous plants, shrubs have persistent woody stems above the ground. Shrubs can be either deciduous or evergreen. They are distinguished from trees ...

s, including species of alder, ash, walnut, sycamore, poplar, mesquite, and willow. It is known from over 60 species of

hardwood Hardwood is wood from dicot trees. These are usually found in broad-leaved temperate and tropical forests. In temperate and boreal latitudes they are mostly deciduous, but in tropics and subtropics mostly evergreen. Hardwood (which comes from ...

trees,Gilbertson, R. & R. Mathiasen. (2001). First report of ''Phoradendron macrophyllum'' on ''Populus tremuloides''. ''Plant Disease'' 85:10 1120. but it has not been reported on oaks. It is a

producing many erect green branches which can exceed a meter long. Its stems are lined with pairs of oppositely arranged leaves, each rounded or oval in shape and 3 to 4 centimeters long. As a hemiparasite the mistletoe taps its host tree for water and nutrients but contains some

chlorophyll Chlorophyll (also chlorophyl) is any of several related green pigments found in cyanobacteria and in the chloroplasts of algae and plants. Its name is derived from the Greek words , ("pale green") and , ("leaf"). Chlorophyll allow plants to a ...

and can photosynthesize some energy for itself as well. The plant is

dioecious Dioecy (; ; adj. dioecious , ) is a characteristic of a species, meaning that it has distinct individual organisms (unisexual) that produce male or female gametes, either directly (in animals) or indirectly (in seed plants). Dioecious reproductio ...

, with male and female individuals producing different forms of inflorescence with rough elongated clusters of flowers. Female flowers yield white to light pink spherical berries each 4 or 5 millimeters wide.

References

External links

Jepson Manual Treatment for ''Phoradendron macrophyllum''

USDA Plants Profile of ''Phoradendron macrophyllum'' ssp. ''macrophyllum''
* ttp://calphotos.berkeley.edu/cgi/img_query?query_src=photos_index&where-taxon=Phoradendron+macrophyllum ''Phoradendron macrophyllum'' — UC Photo gallery {{Taxonbar, from=Q7187360 macrophyllum Parasitic plants Flora of Northeastern Mexico Flora of Northwestern Mexico Flora of the Southwestern United States Flora of Arizona Flora of Baja California Flora of California Flora of Chihuahua (state) Flora of New Mexico Flora of Oregon Flora of Sonora Flora of Texas Flora of the California desert regions Flora of the Chihuahuan Desert Flora of the Sierra Nevada (United States) Flora of the Sonoran Deserts Flora of the Rio Grande valleys Natural history of the California Coast Ranges Natural history of the Colorado Desert Natural history of the Mojave Desert Dioecious plants Flora without expected TNC conservation status