Lycium pallidum var. oligospermum

Pale wolfberry

Family: Solanaceae · Type: shrub · Native

Pale wolfberry is a California native shrub found in the northern Mojave Desert and northern Colorado Desert on flats, washes, and slopes at elevations below 1,200 meters. Flowering from March to May, this plant produces green-white flowers with purple tinge, bell-shaped with narrow funnel-shaped corollas. Growing 0.5 to 1.2 meters tall with many spreading to ascending branches, it is distinctively very thorny and glabrous. Its leaves are glaucous, oblong to narrowly obovate, 10 to 50 millimeters long, and arranged sparsely along the branches. The fruit is a firm, green-purple berry 8 to 10 millimeters long, containing 5 to 7 seeds.

Habitat: Flats, washes, slopes

Bloom period: Mar-May

Elevation: < 1200 m

Bioregions: DMoj, n DSon

California counties: San Bernardino, Riverside, Inyo

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