Flora of North America species comparison

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Clarkia prostrata

prostrate clarkia
Stems

prostrate or decumbent, to 50 cm, sparsely puberulent.
Leaves

sessile or subsessile;

blade oblanceolate to elliptic, 1–2.5 cm, apex usually obtuse.
Inflorescences

prostrate, dense racemes, axis straight;

buds erect.
Flowers

floral tube 4–7 mm;

sepals usually reflexed in pairs;

corolla bowl-shaped, petals lavender-pink shading pale yellow basally, with reddish purple spot above base, 10–15 mm;

stamens 8, subequal;

ovary 8-grooved;

stigma not exserted beyond anthers.
Capsules

20–30 mm.
Seeds

brown or gray, 1–1.5 mm, scaly, crest 0.2 mm.
2n

= 52.

Clarkia prostrata
Phenology Flowering May–Jul.
Habitat Coastal bluffs in grasslands and closed-cone pine forests.
Elevation 0–100 m. (0–300 ft.)
Distribution
from FNA
CA
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

Clarkia prostrata, like C. davyi, occurs only on coastal bluffs and adjacent low elevation pine forests along the Pacific coast, and in this case only in the California Central Coast Subregion in Monterey, Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz, and San Luis Obispo counties.

Clarkia prostrata is a hexaploid that combines the tetraploid genome of C. davyi and the diploid genome of C. speciosa. Clarkia prostrata is morphologically and ecologically very similar to C. davyi but can usually be distinguished by its larger flowers with a spot on each petal. It differs from C. speciosa by having smaller flowers with the stigma not exserted beyond the anthers.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Source FNA vol. 10.
Parent taxa Onagraceae > subfam. Onagroideae > tribe Onagreae > Clarkia > sect. Godetia
Sibling taxa
C. affinis, C. amoena, C. arcuata, C. australis, C. biloba, C. borealis, C. bottae, C. breweri, C. concinna, C. cylindrica, C. davyi, C. delicata, C. dudleyana, C. epilobioides, C. exilis, C. franciscana, C. gracilis, C. heterandra, C. imbricata, C. jolonensis, C. lassenensis, C. lewisii, C. lingulata, C. mildrediae, C. modesta, C. mosquinii, C. pulchella, C. purpurea, C. rhomboidea, C. rostrata, C. rubicunda, C. similis, C. speciosa, C. springvillensis, C. stellata, C. tembloriensis, C. unguiculata, C. virgata, C. williamsonii, C. xantiana
Name authority H. Lewis & M. E. Lewis: Madroño 12: 36. (1953)
Web links 
Unless otherwise noted, all data comes from the online version of the Flora of North America, who have made most of their content available via a Creative Commons license (CC BY 4.0).



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