Rosa californica

California rose

Family: Rosaceae · Type: shrub · Native

California rose is a native shrub found in California Floristic Province (excluding Cascade Ranges, High Sierra Nevada, and Tehachapi Mountains) in generally moist areas, especially streambanks at elevations below 1,800 meters. Flowering from February to November, this plant produces delicate pink flowers 15 to 25 millimeters wide with multiple petals. Growing as a thicket-forming shrub 80 to 250 centimeters tall, it features curved prickles 3 to 15 millimeters long with thick bases. Its compound leaves have 5 to 7 leaflets, with terminal leaflets 15 to 50 millimeters long, ovate-elliptic in shape and featuring single or double-toothed margins. The fruit is an obovoid rose hip 8 to 15 millimeters wide, with persistent erect sepals.

Habitat: Generally +- moist areas, especially streambanks

Bloom period: Feb-Nov

Elevation: < 1800 m

Bioregions: CA-FP (exc CaRH, SNH, Teh)

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

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