Sidalcea malviflora subsp. californica

Chaparral checkerbloom, california checkerbloom, California Checkerbloom

Family: Malvaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Conservation status: CNPS PPD

Chaparral checkerbloom is a California native perennial found in southern Santa Lucia Mountains and western Transverse Ranges in coastal scrub and chaparral habitats at elevations below 1,000 meters. Flowering from March to June, this plant produces soft pink to lavender flowers in open, generally unbranched inflorescences. Growing 40 to 100 centimeters tall with a decumbent base and covered in soft gray stellate hairs, the plant has a distinctive appearance. Its leaves are densely soft-stellate-hairy, with lower leaves shallowly lobed and upper leaves deeply divided into 7 lobes, featuring forked hairs on the upper leaf surface. The fruit segments are 3 to 3.5 millimeters long, glandular-puberulent with coarsely net-veined pitting.

Habitat: Coastal scrub, chaparral

Bloom period: Mar-Jun

Elevation: < 1000 m

Bioregions: s SCoRO, WTR.

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