Chaenactis stevioides

Desert pincushion

Family: Asteraceae · Type: annual · Native

Desert pincushion is a California native annual found in southern Sierra Nevada, Tehachapi, southern San Joaquin Valley, south Coast Ranges, northern Transverse Ranges, Great Basin, and Desert regions in open sandy or gravelly flats and slopes at elevations of -30 to 2,100 meters. Flowering from February to June, this plant produces white to pale pink or pale yellow flowers in radiant heads 3 to 20 per stem. Growing with slender stems 5 to 30 centimeters tall, it develops branching stems with cobwebby-silky grayish hairs persisting at nodes. Its leaves are 1 to 8 centimeters long with elliptic blades that are 1 to 2-pinnately lobed, featuring 4 to 8 pairs of lobes with curled and twisted tips. The fruit is 4 to 6.5 millimeters long with pappus scales 1.5 to 6 millimeters in length.

Habitat: Abundant in higher DMoj, SNE. Open sandy or gravelly flats, slopes

Bloom period: Feb-Jun

Elevation: -30-2100(2800) m

Bioregions: s SNH, Teh, s SnJV, SCoRI, n edge TR, GB, D

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