Castilleja tenuiflora |
Castilleja mollis |
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Catalina Indian paintbrush, Santa Catalina Indian paintbrush, Santa Catalina paintbrush |
soft leaf Indian paintbrush, soft-leaf paintbrush |
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Habit | Herbs or subshrubs, perennial, 3–4 dm; from a woody caudex; with woody roots. | |
Stems | few to several, ± prostrate, sometimes ascending, much-branched, with dense, matlike growth form, often with short, leafy axillary shoots, hairs dense, tangled, short to long, fairly stiff, branched, sometimes glandular, white-woolly. |
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Leaves | green to deep purple, narrowly elliptic to oblong, ovate, or obovate, 1–3 cm, ± fleshy, margins plane or ± wavy, flat, 0-lobed, apex rounded, rarely acute. |
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Inflorescences | usually erect, 2.5–8 × 1.5–4 cm; bracts proximally greenish, distally pale to bright yellow, sometimes brownish orange, sometimes with brownish orange medial band, oblong, elliptic, or obovate, ± cup-shaped, ± fleshy, 0–3-lobed; lobes erect, oblong, short, arising near tip, central lobe apex rounded to truncate, sometimes crenate or with obtuse teeth, lateral ones obtuse. |
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Corollas | straight, 17–26 mm; tube 12–13 mm; beak often slightly exserted, adaxially green to yellow-green, 11–13 mm; abaxial lip green, reduced, 1.5–3.5 mm, 10–20% as long as beak; teeth incurved, reduced, green, 0.5–1 mm. |
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Calyces | colored as bracts, lacking orange central band, 16–23 mm; abaxial clefts 9.5–14 mm, adaxial 8 mm, abaxial 50–67% of calyx length, adaxial 35–45% of calyx length, deeper than laterals, lateral 4.5–5 mm, 20–25% of calyx length; lobes oblong to triangular, abaxials sometimes wider than adaxials, apex acute to rounded, inner surface glabrous. |
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2n | = 24. |
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Castilleja tenuiflora |
Castilleja mollis |
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Phenology | Flowering Apr–Aug. | |
Habitat | Sandy openings in coastal scrub, thin sandy soils over limestone terraces, north- or northwest-facing sandy bluffs, dunes. | |
Elevation | 0–100 m. (0–300 ft.) | |
Distribution |
AZ; NM; Mexico
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CA
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Discussion | 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 mollis is federally listed as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act of the United States. It is endemic to the coastal terraces of the northern portion of Santa Rosa Island, Santa Barbara County, in the northern Channel Islands of southern California. It is recorded historically from San Miguel Island. Much of the available low-elevation habitat on Santa Rosa Island was degraded by trampling and grazing of introduced ungulates, which also resulted in the apparent loss of a natural population on the western end of San Miguel Island, last seen in the 1930s and now believed extirpated. Reports of C. mollis from the Oso Flaco Lake area of the mainland, in San Luis Obispo County, are based on populations of C. affinis var. contentiosa. Castilleja mollis is most closely related to C. latifolia of the central California coast and a sister species to the north, C. mendocinensis. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Source | FNA vol. 17, p. 659. | FNA vol. 17, p. 632. |
Parent taxa | Orobanchaceae > Castilleja | Orobanchaceae > Castilleja |
Sibling taxa | ||
Subordinate taxa | ||
Name authority | Bentham: Pl. Hartw., 22. (1839) | Pennell: Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Philadelphia 99: 185. (1947) |
Web links |