Orochaenactis thysanocarpha

California mountainpincushion

Family: Asteraceae · Type: annual · Native

California mountainpincushion is a California native annual found in southern Sierra Nevada Mountains in open conifer forest, dry meadows, and gravelly slopes at elevations of 1,600 to 3,800 meters. Flowering from June to September, this plant produces yellow flowers in small heads 6 to 8 millimeters long with purple-tinged involucre bracts. Growing with slender spreading to erect stems 1 to 25 centimeters tall that are short-hairy and sometimes glandular, it has a delicate branching habit. Its leaves range from 1 to 4 centimeters long, linear to narrowly oblong-oblanceolate, with proximal leaves opposite and distal leaves alternate. The fruit is a club-shaped, ribbed structure 2.5 to 4 millimeters long with a distinctive pappus of 11 to 17 fringed scales.

Habitat: Open conifer forest, dry meadows, gravelly slopes

Bloom period: Jun-Sep

Elevation: 1600-3800 m

Bioregions: s SNH.

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