Calochortus coeruleus

Beavertail-grass, Beavertail-Grass

Family: Liliaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Beavertail-grass is a California native perennial found in northwestern California, the Cascade Ranges, and the Sierra Nevada Mountains in gravelly woodland openings at elevations of 600 to 2,500 meters. Flowering from May to June, this plant produces blue flowers 8 to 12 millimeters long with obovate petals that are ciliate and hairy on the inner surface. Growing with slender stems 3 to 15 centimeters tall that are simple and sometimes wavy, it has long basal leaves up to 20 centimeters in length. Its distinctive blue petals feature a transverse, arched nectary bordered by delicate ciliate membranes and short hairs. The fruit is a nodding, widely elliptic structure 10 to 15 millimeters long.

Habitat: Common. Gravelly openings in woodland

Bloom period: May-Jun

Elevation: 600-2500 m

Bioregions: NW, CaR, SNH.

California counties: El Dorado, Plumas, Nevada, Glenn, Siskiyou, Trinity, Del Norte, Shasta, Mendocino, Placer, Amador, Calaveras, Kern, Humboldt, Lassen, San Mateo, Yuba, Butte, Lake, Sierra, Tehama, Alpine, Solano, Madera

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