Anemone oregana var. oregana

Blue windflower

Family: Ranunculaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Blue windflower is a California native perennial found in the Klamath Ranges and high Cascade Range in shaded conifer forest sites at elevations of 100 to 1,900 meters. Flowering from March to June, this plant produces blue to purple (and occasionally pink or white) flowers with 5 to 7 sepals 10 to 20 millimeters long. Growing 8 to 30 centimeters tall with a spreading, thick rhizome, it emerges from underground with a single delicate stem. Its leaves feature a distinctive involucre with diamond-shaped or ovate leaflets 2 to 8 centimeters long, with crenate to sharply serrate margins on the upper half. The fruit develops as a small spherical aggregate 8 to 15 millimeters wide with a short, straight beak.

Habitat: Shaded sites, conifer forest

Bloom period: Mar-Jun

Elevation: 100-1900 m

Bioregions: KR, CaRH

California counties: Del Norte, Yuba, Siskiyou, Humboldt, Trinity, Santa Cruz, Shasta

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