Lupinus elatus

Silky lupine, Silky Lupine

Family: Fabaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Conservation status: CNPS 4.3

Silky lupine is a California native perennial found in southern Sierra Nevada and Transverse Ranges in dry conifer forest at elevations of 1,500 to 3,000 meters. Flowering from June to August, this plant produces lavender to blue flowers with a pale yellow banner spot, arranged in whorled clusters 5 to 40 centimeters long. Growing with erect silvery-woolly stems 50 to 90 centimeters tall, it develops a distinctive upright habit. Its palmately compound leaves have 6 to 8 leaflets, each 20 to 80 millimeters long, covered in silky silvery hairs. The fruit is a 2 to 3 centimeter pod containing 4 to 6 mottled olive-brown seeds.

Habitat: dry conifer forest

Bloom period: Jun-Aug

Elevation: 1500-3000 m

Bioregions: s SNH, TR.

California counties: Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Ventura, Kern, Tulare, Inyo, Santa Barbara, Riverside, Fresno

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