Leptosiphon ciliatus

Whisker brush

Family: Polemoniaceae · Type: annual · Native

Whisker brush is a California native annual herb found in the California Floristic Province and North Coast Ranges in open and wooded areas at elevations below 3,000 meters. Flowering from March to July, this plant produces white or pink flowers with yellow throats, typically 10 to 25 millimeters long, featuring delicate rounded lobes with a distinctive darker pink or red spot at the base. Growing with hairy stems 2 to 30 centimeters tall, it has a delicate, spreading form. Its leaves are composed of narrow linear lobes 5 to 20 millimeters long, with white-fringed bracts adding to its distinctive appearance. The flowers, which are salverform in shape and hairy on the exterior, emerge in compact heads with stamens extending beyond the corolla.

Habitat: Common. Open or wooded areas

Bloom period: Mar-Jul

Elevation: < 3000 m

Bioregions: CA-FP, MP.

California counties: Mendocino, San Luis Obispo, Fresno, Kern, Los Angeles, Mono, San Bernardino, San Diego, Riverside, Tulare, Nevada, Sierra, Lassen, Butte, Mariposa, El Dorado, Calaveras, Madera, Amador, Tuolumne, Colusa, Alpine, Siskiyou, Lake, Trinity, Placer, Santa Barbara, Yolo, San Benito, Contra Costa, Solano, Shasta, Tehama, Orange, Ventura, Inyo, Modoc, Plumas, Napa, Monterey, Sonoma, Sutter, Merced, Del Norte, Humboldt, Stanislaus, Santa Clara, Yuba

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