Ephedra torreyana

Torrey's Mormon- tea, Torrey's Mormon-tea

Family: Ephedraceae

Conservation status: CNPS 2B.1

Torrey's mormon-tea is a California native shrub found in southern California's desert mountains and Mojave Desert regions in desert scrub and pinyon-juniper woodland at elevations of 1,000 to 1,800 meters. Not producing traditional flowers, this plant is a dioecious gymnosperm with green to yellowish-green photosynthetic stems that are slender and segmented. Growing as an erect to spreading shrub 30 to 100 centimeters tall with multiple branching stems, it forms dense, intricate clumps in arid landscapes. Its small, scale-like leaves are reduced to tiny brownish triangular structures at stem joints, giving the plant a distinctive wiry and minimalist appearance. The plant produces small cones at stem nodes, which serve as its reproductive structures in place of typical flowers.

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