Tecticornia pergranulata

Erect to decumbent shrub to c. 50 (rarely c. 100) cm high. Articles of ultimate branchlets cylindric to obovoid, usually dull, often glaucous, mostly 1–5 mm long; lobes rounded, margins entire. Spikes terminal, to c. 5 cm long; opposite bracts united, margins entire; flowers free or fused to each other and to upper bract; perianth truncate or rounded at apex. Fruiting perianth and pericarp fused, spongy or pithy; seed broadly ovate to circular, c. 1 mm long, readily released from perianth at maturity, testa crustaceous, dark reddish-brown to black, covered all over by concentric rows of horseshoe-shaped, tuberculate ridges.