Cryptantha muricata var. muricata

Showy prickly-nut cryptantha

Family: Boraginaceae · Type: annual · Native

Showy prickly-nut cryptantha is a California native annual found in southern San Joaquin Valley, central western California, and southwestern California in gravelly and sandy soils of coastal scrub, chaparral, and foothill woodland at elevations of 25 to 2,130 meters. Flowering from March to July, this plant produces small white flowers with yellow appendages approximately 4 to 8 millimeters in diameter. Growing 10 to 60 centimeters tall with a single central stem and few to many long, laxly-ascending branches, it has a distinctively rough and dense-hairy appearance with soft and spreading hairs. Its leaves are densely covered in soft and spreading rough hairs, becoming reduced toward the stem's upper portions. The distinctive nutlets are 1.6 to 2.1 millimeters long, densely covered in coarse tubercles with a slightly convex back surface.

Habitat: Gravelly, sandy soils, generally granitic, coastal scrub, chaparral, foothill woodland, occasionally open conifer forest

Bloom period: Mar-Jul

Elevation: 25-2130 m

Bioregions: s SnJV, CW (exc CCo), SW.

California counties: Los Angeles, Ventura, Riverside, Merced, Kern, Santa Barbara, Monterey, San Bernardino, Tulare, Tehama, San Diego, Orange, San Luis Obispo, Imperial, Santa Clara

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