Arctostaphylos nummularia

Glossy leaved manzanita

Family: Ericaceae · Type: shrub · Native

Glossy leaved manzanita is a California native shrub found in the Sierra Nevada Mountains in rocky, montane habitats at elevations between 1,000 to 2,500 meters. Flowering from January to March, this plant produces white to pink urn-shaped flowers in pendulous panicle clusters with 4 to 12 branches. Growing with distinctive gray to red-gray bark and spreading stems densely covered in short and long glandular hairs, it forms a compact shrub 30 to 100 centimeters tall. Its leaves are particularly distinctive, with shiny dark green upper surfaces and light green undersides, spreading horizontally with entire margins and gently cupped texture. The fruit is a small, nearly cylindric structure approximately 3 to 4 millimeters wide that splits open when mature.

California counties: Marin, Mendocino, Santa Cruz, Sonoma, San Francisco, Santa Clara, San Mateo

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