Arctostaphylos catalinae

Santa catalina island manzanita, Santa Catalina Island manzanita, Santa Catalina Island manzanita

Family: Ericaceae · Type: shrub · Native

Conservation status: CNPS 1B.2

Santa catalina island manzanita is a rare (CNPS 1B.2) California native shrub found in southern Channel Islands on Santa Catalina Island in volcanic outcrops and maritime chaparral at elevations of 100 to 600 meters. Flowering from December to February, this plant produces pale pink to white urn-shaped flowers in dense panicles with pendulous nascent inflorescences. Growing as an erect shrub two to five meters tall with distinctively gnarled branches densely covered in white glandular and non-glandular hairs, it forms a compact and textured silhouette. Its leaves are lance-ovate to elliptic, two to five centimeters long, with a green-glaucous color, truncate base, and entire to slightly serrate margins that feel scabrous and glandular-bristly to the touch. The fruit is a spherical, white-hairy drupe approximately eight to fifteen millimeters wide with variably fused stone structures.

Habitat: Volcanic outcrops, ridges, maritime chaparral

Bloom period: Dec-Feb

Elevation: 100-600 m

Bioregions: s ChI (Santa Catalina Island).

California counties: Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, Orange

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