Aphanisma blitoides

Aphanisma, aphanisma, aphanisma

Family: Chenopodiaceae · Type: annual · Native

Conservation status: CNPS 1B.2

Aphanisma is a rare (CNPS 1B.2) California native annual found in southern California Coast Ranges, southern California Coast, and Channel Islands in coastal scrub and saline sand habitats at elevations below 200 meters. Flowering from June to September, this plant produces small flowers in compact axillary clusters with 1 to 3 blossoms. Growing with fleshy stems 10 to 60 centimeters tall, the plant branches from its base and has a distinctive decumbent to erect form. Its leaves are alternate, gradually reducing in size up the stem, with lower leaves sessile and upper leaves cordate-clasping, measuring 2 to 5 centimeters long in an elliptic to ovate shape. The fruit is a small, depressed-spheric structure with a distinctive thickened equatorial margin, containing a single horizontal black seed.

Habitat: Coastal scrub, bluffs, saline sand

Bloom period: Jun-Sep

Elevation: < 200 m

Bioregions: s CCo, SCo, ChI

California counties: Orange, San Diego, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, Ventura

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