Encelia virginensis

Encelia

Family: Asteraceae · Type: shrub · Native

Encelia is a California native shrub found in the eastern Mojave Desert and Mojave Desert Mountains on desert flats, rocky slopes, and roadsides at elevations of 500 to 1,500 meters. Flowering from March to June and in December, this plant produces yellow disk flowers in heads with 11 to 21 white ray flowers 8 to 15 millimeters long. Growing with slender branches 50 to 150 centimeters tall, it has young stems that are hairy and older stems with fissured bark. Its scattered leaves are narrowly ovate to triangular, 1.2 to 2.5 centimeters long, gray-green in color with sparse stiff hairs and a soft, light covering. The fruit is 5 to 8 millimeters long, typically without a pappus.

Habitat: Desert flats, rocky slopes, roadsides

Bloom period: Mar-Jun, Dec

Elevation: 500-1500 m

Bioregions: e DMoj, DMtns

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