Amaranthus cruentus

Purple amaranth, Purple Amaranth

Family: Amaranthaceae · Type: perennial · Not Native

Purple amaranth is a naturalized plant found in the Great Valley, central Coast Ranges, San Francisco Bay Area, and southern Great Basin in disturbed areas and roadsides at elevations below 200 meters. Flowering from July to October, this plant produces dark red to purple flowers in panicle-like terminal inflorescences with thin lateral axes. Growing with ascending or erect stems 3 to 20 decimeters tall, often red-tinged and slightly hairy, it has a branching habit. Its leaves are rhombic-ovate to lanceolate, 25 to 145 millimeters long with wedge-shaped bases and acute tips, carried on petioles 2.5 to 9 centimeters long. The fruit is a circumscissile capsule 1.5 to 2.5 millimeters long, ranging from reddish to brown, containing seeds that can be white to ivory or dark red to black.

Habitat: Disturbed areas, roadsides

Bloom period: Jul-Oct

Elevation: < 200 m

Bioregions: GV, CCo, SnFrB, SnGb

Data from The California Species Project — 14,000+ California species with verified data from CNPS, CDFW, USFWS, Jepson eFlora, Cal-IPC, and more.