Glinus lotoides

Lotus sweetjuice

Family: Molluginaceae · Type: annual · Not Native

Lotus sweetjuice is a naturalized annual found in northern California coastal ranges, Great Valley, San Francisco Bay Area, southern coastal ranges, southern California, western Transverse Ranges, San Gabriel Mountains, and Peninsular Ranges in moist or seasonally dry wetland margins at elevations below 1,000 meters. Flowering from June to November, this plant produces small white to pale green flowers in clusters of 3 to 15 blooms. Growing with stems 5 to 35 centimeters tall, it spreads in low, sprawling formations with grayish-green foliage. Its leaves are small, 5 to 30 millimeters long, with obovate to round blades that have a soft, somewhat gray-green appearance. The fruit is approximately 3.5 to 4.5 millimeters long with orange-brown seeds featuring distinctive black tubercles.

Habitat: Uncommon. Moist or seasonally dry margins of wetlands

Bloom period: Jun-Nov

Elevation: < 1000 m

Bioregions: NCoR, GV, SnFrB, SCoRO, SCo, WTR, SnGb, PR

California counties: Riverside, San Diego, Placer, Santa Clara, Napa, Marin, San Luis Obispo, Sonoma, Los Angeles, Colusa, Butte, Mendocino, Lake, Yuba, Amador, Calaveras, Monterey, Tulare, El Dorado, Sacramento, San Joaquin, Kern, Tehama, Glenn, Alameda, Merced, Stanislaus

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