Castilleja miniata |
Castilleja pulchella |
|||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
common paintbrush, common red paintbrush, giant red Indian paintbrush, great red paintbrush, scarlet Indian paintbrush, scarlet or common or giant red paintbrush, scarlet paintbrush |
beautiful Indian paintbrush, beautiful paintbrush, showy paintbrush |
|||||||||||||
Habit | Herbs, perennial, 1.2–8(–10) dm; from a woody caudex (or slender rooting rhizomes in var. dixonii, var. miniata); with a taproot or with slender, branched roots from a rhizome. | Herbs, perennial, 0.5–1(–2) dm; from a woody caudex; with a slender taproot. | ||||||||||||
Stems | few to many, erect to ascending, rarely proximally decumbent or creeping and rooting at nodes, usually branched, glabrous, glabrate, or hairy, hairs spreading to ± retrorse, short to long, soft to stiff, rarely stipitate-glandular. |
few to several, erect or ascending, usually decumbent at base, unbranched, sometimes branched, hairs spreading, short and long, soft, mostly glandular. |
||||||||||||
Leaves | green to purple, linear to lanceolate, narrowly elliptic, narrowly oblong, or ovate, (1.5–)3–8(–9.5) cm, thin and not fleshy or slightly to moderately thickened and slightly fleshy, margins plane, rarely wavy, flat to involute, whole leaf sometimes recurved downward, 0(–5)-lobed, apex acute to obtuse, sometimes rounded; lobes ascending-spreading, narrowly lanceolate, apex acute. |
green to deep purple, linear to broadly lanceolate, 1–3.5(–5) cm, not fleshy, margins plane or wavy, slightly involute, (0–)3–5-lobed, apex acuminate to acute, sometimes obtuse; lateral lobes ascending-spreading, sometimes widely spreading, narrowly lanceolate to linear, mostly short, apex acute. |
||||||||||||
Inflorescences | 3–15(–22) × 1.5–5.5 cm, often bearing a thin, white, powdery exudate, especially on bract surfaces; bracts greenish, scarlet, red, red-orange, or pale orange throughout, sometimes pink, magenta, pink-purple, yellow, greenish yellow, white, or salmon throughout, or proximally greenish, distally colored as above, lanceolate to oblong-ovate, 0–5(–7)-lobed, central lobes sometimes distally apiculate; lobes erect, linear to lanceolate, oblong, or oblanceolate, short or medium length, arising near or above mid length, central lobe apex obtuse, rounded, or truncate, lateral ones rounded to acute or acuminate. |
2–7 × 1.5–3 cm; bracts yellow-green, yellow, pinkish, pale reddish, or purple, sometimes distal margins pale white, oblong to broadly lanceolate to ovate, 0–5-lobed; lobes spreading, linear to narrowly lanceolate, medium length to long, usually arising above mid length, rarely from below mid length, center lobe apex rounded to truncate, lateral ones acute to obtuse. |
||||||||||||
Pedicels | 0–5 mm. |
|||||||||||||
Corollas | slightly curved, 20–48 mm; tube 12–26 mm; abaxial lip usually not exserted, though often visible in front calyx cleft, beak partially to fully exserted; beak adaxially green to yellow-green or whitish, (9–)14–25 mm; abaxial lip incurved or ascending, deep green or green, sometimes deep purple or yellowish, reduced, not inflated, visible in front cleft, 0.5–3.5 mm, 5–20% as long as beak (to ca. 33% as long as beak in some populations of var. miniata); teeth incurved or erect, green or white, 0.7–1.5 mm. |
straight or slightly curved, 17–22(–25) mm; tube 11–16 mm; subequal to calyx or beak, sometimes abaxial lip, exserted; beak adaxially yellow to green, 4–6(–7) mm; abaxial lip green or yellow, reduced, often visible through front cleft, prominently pouched, thickened, 3–4(–5) mm, 50–67% as long as beak; teeth erect, white, yellow, pink, or purple, 1.5–3 mm. |
||||||||||||
Calyces | colored as bracts, 15–38 mm; abaxial and adaxial clefts 4–24 mm, 35–70% of calyx length, deeper than laterals, lateral (1–)3–8(–12) mm, 5–30% of calyx length; lobes linear or narrowly lanceolate to narrowly triangular, apex acute to acuminate or obtuse. |
colored as bracts, sometimes strongly bicolored green or proximally whitish and distally as bract lobes, (12–)13–23(–25) mm; abaxial and adaxial clefts 5–11 mm, 45–55% of calyx length, deeper than laterals, lateral (0.5–)1–3(–5) mm, 5–20% of calyx length; lobes broadly triangular, apex obtuse to rounded, rarely acute. |
||||||||||||
2n | = 24, 48, 72, 96, 120, 144. |
= 24. |
||||||||||||
Castilleja miniata |
Castilleja pulchella |
|||||||||||||
Phenology | Flowering (May–)Jun–Aug. | |||||||||||||
Habitat | Moist meadows, turf, rocky slopes and flats, talus, fellfields, subalpine to alpine. | |||||||||||||
Elevation | 1800–3500 m. (5900–11500 ft.) | |||||||||||||
Distribution |
AK; AZ; CA; CO; ID; MT; NM; NV; OR; UT; WA; WY; AB; BC; MB; ON; SK; YT; nw Mexico
|
ID; MT; UT; WY
|
||||||||||||
Discussion | Varieties 4 (4 in the flora). Castilleja miniata is widely recognized as the common scarlet paintbrush. It is highly variable and has five levels of polyploidy. Nonetheless, it remains fairly well defined morphologically across its wide range. Native Americans use it medicinally. A probable hybrid with C. septentrionalis from southern Nevada was named C. ×porterae Cockerell. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Castilleja pulchella is a mostly alpine species of the mountains of western Montana and adjacent Idaho and northwestern Wyoming, as well as in the Uinta Mountains of northeastern Utah. It is similar to and likely shares ancestry with C. chrysantha of the mountains of northeastern Oregon. Castilleja pulchella is variable in color, with inflorescences ranging from pale yellow to purplish, often within the same population. Some lower elevation populations are known. These plants are considerably taller, and they tend to have only yellowish inflorescences. Where the two occur together, C. pulchella occasionally forms hybrids with C. nivea. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
||||||||||||
Key |
|
|||||||||||||
Source | FNA vol. 17, p. 627. | FNA vol. 17, p. 648. | ||||||||||||
Parent taxa | Orobanchaceae > Castilleja | Orobanchaceae > Castilleja | ||||||||||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||||||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||||||||||
Name authority | Douglas ex Hooker: Fl. Bor.-Amer. 2: 106. (1838) | Rydberg: Bull. Torrey Bot. Club 34: 40. (1907) | ||||||||||||
Web links |
|