Castilleja tenuiflora
Castilleja chrymactis
Catalina Indian paintbrush, Santa Catalina Indian paintbrush, Santa Catalina paintbrush
green Indian paintbrush, green paintbrush
several to many, erect to ascending, unbranched or branched, sometimes with short, leafy axillary shoots, glabrous or hairs sparse proximally, distally spreading-erect, long, soft, eglandular, mixed with shorter ones.
green or purple-tinged, sometimes deep purple, linear-lanceolate to lanceolate or ovate, (1.5–)5–11.7 cm, not fleshy, margins plane, sometimes ± wavy, flat or involute, 0–3(–5)-lobed, apex acute to obtuse, sometimes rounded;
lobes erect or ascending, linear, apex acute or acuminate.
3.5–18 × 3–7.5 cm;
bracts proximally pale green to dull purplish, distally bright red or scarlet to yellow, orange, yellow-orange, and salmon, sometimes tricolored with central band of deeper purple or deeper shade of the far-distal color, broadly lanceolate, oblong, elliptic, or oblong, 0–3(–9)-lobed;
lobes ascending, lanceolate, triangular, or oblong, short, arising at or above mid length, central lobe apex rounded, lateral ones acute to obtuse.
straight to slightly curved, 26–43 mm;
tube 16–24 mm;
beak exserted, adaxially green to yellow, 9–19 mm;
abaxial lip whitish or dark green, reduced, not exserted, sometimes visible through front calyx cleft, 1.5–2 mm, 20% as long as beak, glabrous or sparsely hairy, hairs spreading;
teeth reduced, incurved, deep green, 0.5–1 mm.
colored as bracts, sometimes more deeply pigmented and contrasting with bract coloration, 24–31 mm;
abaxial and adaxial clefts 12–19 mm, 45–65% of calyx length, deeper than laterals, lateral 7–11 mm, 25–32% of calyx length;
lobes lanceolate, narrowly triangular, or almost oblong, apex acute, sometimes obtuse or acuminate.
Castilleja tenuiflora
Castilleja chrymactis
Varieties 3 (1 in the flora).
Castilleja tenuiflora is common and widespread across the mountains of Mexico, especially in pine-oak-madrone communities at middle elevations, as far south as Oaxaca, where it is found west and north of the Tehuantepec lowlands. There are two varieties of C. tenuiflora endemic to Mexico, while the typical variety crosses into the mountains of southeast Arizona and southwest New Mexico. Considerable local and regional variation exists in C. tenuiflora, but most of this appears to be racial in nature, and additional named varieties are likely not justified. While also commonly herbaceous, C. tenuiflora often forms large, multi-stemmed, subshrub plants with a woody base and ascending to strongly erect and often branched stems. It is valued in Mexican traditional medicine and is under study for potentially useful compounds (M. Jiménez et al. 1995; P. M. Sanchez et al. 2013).
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Castilleja chrymactis is restricted to the coast of southeastern Alaska, from Glacier Bay to Yakutat. In some respects, it resembles a hybrid swarm between C. miniata and C. unalaschcensis. If C. chrymactis originated as a hybrid, at present it has formed a number of populations and has a stable morphology that differs from both putative parents, especially in calyx structure. Reports of its introduction to Point Reyes, California (T. I. Chuang and L. R. Heckard 1993b), are based on C. leschkeana, a distinctive species known only from two records near the type locality and presumed to be extinct.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
WildflowerSearch
iNaturalist
USDA Plants Database
