Cryptantha kinkiensis

San clemente island upland cryptantha

Family: Boraginaceae · Type: annual · Native

San clemente island upland cryptantha is a California native annual found on San Clemente Island in island scrub and grassland vegetation at elevations of 50 to 600 meters. Flowering from March to May, this delicate plant produces white to yellow flowers with a corolla limb 4 to 7 millimeters in diameter. Growing with multiple branching stems 10 to 35 centimeters tall, the plant is characterized by sparse appressed and spreading short rough hairs. Its leaves are 1.5 to 2 centimeters long, lanceolate to linear, with adaxial surfaces covered in minutely bulbous-based appressed hairs and abaxial surfaces coarse-bristly. The fruit consists of generally four nutlets, lance-ovate and brown, with papillate and finely-tubercled surfaces.

Habitat: Flats and clayey slopes, island scrub and grassland vegetation, mostly at higher elevations (> 200 m) throughout much of the island

Bloom period: Mar-May

Elevation: 50-600 m

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