Polemonium californicum
California polemonium
Family: Polemoniaceae · Type: perennial · Native
California polemonium is a California native perennial found in the Klamath Ranges, northern California High Sierra, and northern Sierra Nevada Mountains in dry, open to shaded montane forest areas at elevations of 1,600 to 3,100 meters. Flowering from June to August, this plant produces light to dark blue or purple flowers in bell-shaped blossoms approximately 7 to 15 millimeters in diameter. Growing with decumbent to erect stems 12 to 25 centimeters tall, the plant forms dense cespitose clusters with glandular-hairy stems. Its leaves are primarily basal, with 9 to 25 elliptic to lanceolate leaflets that are 10 to 25 millimeters long, arranged with the terminal leaflet slightly fused to adjacent leaflets. The fruit is small, measuring 2 to 4 millimeters long, containing 6 to 10 brown seeds.
Habitat: Dry, open to shaded areas in montane forest
Bloom period: Jun-Aug
Elevation: 1600-3100 m
Bioregions: KR, CaRH, n&c SNH
California counties: Tulare, Alpine, Plumas, Fresno, El Dorado, Sierra, Siskiyou, Trinity, Nevada, Mariposa, Shasta, Placer, Tuolumne, Amador, Tehama, Madera, San Diego, Marin
Data from The California Species Project — 14,000+ California species with verified data from CNPS, CDFW, USFWS, Jepson eFlora, Cal-IPC, and more.