Lasthenia microglossa

Small-ray goldfields

Family: Asteraceae · Type: annual · Native

Small-ray goldfields is a California native annual found in northern Coast Ranges, southern Sierra Nevada foothills, southern California valleys, San Francisco Bay Area, southern Coast Ranges, Transverse Ranges, Peninsular Ranges, and eastern Mojave Desert in shaded woodland, chaparral, and desert scrub slopes at elevations below 1,000 meters. Flowering from March to May, this plant produces yellow flowers with dark red centers in small involucres up to 8.5 millimeters long. Growing with sprawling or erect stems less than 25 centimeters tall, it has a simple or much-branched habit with hairy stems. Its leaves are linear or awl-shaped, 1.5 to 8 centimeters long, hairy, and nearly entire. The fruit is less than 5 millimeters long, linear, hairy, and black with occasional lanceolate scales.

Habitat: Shaded slopes of woodland, chaparral, desert scrub

Bloom period: Mar-May

Elevation: < 1000 m

Bioregions: NCoRI, s SNF, ScV (1 collection), SnFrB, SCoR, TR, PR, DMoj.

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