Dwarf Sand Verbena

Abronia nana is a highly variable species. Perhaps contraction of the range of A. nana during the Pleistocene left isolated populations that have since diverged. This is especially apparent on the southern edge of the range of the species. In northeastern Arizona, densely tufted plants with very small blades are similar to short-leaved plants of A. bigelovii from north-central New Mexico.

Based on the fruits, the taxon described as Abronia nana var. harrisii S. L. Welsh is A. elliptica.

Plants perennial, acaulescent or nearly so, usually cespitose. Leaves: petiole 1-5 cm; blade elliptic to lanceolate, shortly ovate, or oblong-ovate, (0.4 -)0.5-2.5 × (0.2 -)0.4-1.2 cm, less than 3 times as long as wide, margins entire or ± repand and undulate, surfaces glabrous or glandular-pubescent. Inflorescences: bracts lanceolate to ovate, 4-9 × 2-7 mm, scarious, glandular-puberulent, often minutely so; flowers 15-25. Perianth: tube pale pink, 8-30 mm, limb white to pink, 6-10 mm diam. Fruits obovate to obcordate in profile, 6-10 × 5-7 mm, scarious, apex low and broadly conic; wings 5, without dilations , without cavities .

Abronia nana S. Wats. Proc. Am. Acad. 14: 294. 1870
Abronia nana lanciformis M. E. Jones, Contr. West. Bot. 11: 2. 1903.
Cespitose perennial from a thick woody root, the caudex sparsely branched, the branches stout, usually covered by the persistent imbricate petioles; leaves fasciculate, the slender petioles 1-5.5 cm. long, the blades oval, suborbicular, ovate, or oblong-elliptic, 1-2.5 cm. long 0.5-1.4 cm. wide, acute to rounded at the base, rounded to acutish at the apex, thick, entire concolorous, finely shortvillous or minutely hirtellous when young, usually glabrate in age; peduncles scapelike, slender, 7-15 cm. long, viscidvillous; heads many-flowered, the bracts broadly oval, oval-ovate, or oblong, 8-10 mm. long, 4-6 mm. wide, obtuse and apiculate to acutish at the apex, scarious, glandular-puberulent and short-villous.; perianth white, 2-2.5 cm long, the slender tube glandular-puberulent or short-villous, the limb 7-8 mm. broad; fruit turbinate, 7 mm. long, thin-walled, deeply lobed, truncate at the summit and puberulent, glabrous below.
Type locality: Near Beaver City, southern Utah, in dry ravines among junipers. Distribution : Southwestern Utah, northwestern Arizona, and eastern Nevada.