Sidalcea sparsifolia

Southern checkerbloom

Family: Malvaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Southern checkerbloom is a California native perennial found in southern Sierra Nevada foothills, southern Coast Ranges, and southwestern California in periodically moist to dry grassy slopes and chaparral habitats at elevations below 2,200 meters. Flowering from March to June, this plant produces pink to rose-colored flowers 1 to 2.5 centimeters long in branched inflorescences exceeding its leaves. Growing 20 to 80 centimeters tall with stellate or bristly hairs, it emerges from a thick fibrous crown with a short caudex. Its lower leaves are 2 to 6 centimeters wide, deeply crenate to shallowly 7-lobed, covered in stellate hairs and concentrated near the stem base. The fruit segments are 2.5 to 3 millimeters long with weak to moderate net-veined pitting and glandular pubescence.

Habitat: Periodically moist to dry grassy slopes or +- flat places, chaparral often with

Bloom period: Mar-Jun

Elevation: < 2200 m

Bioregions: s SNF, SCoRO, SW

California counties: Kern, Riverside, San Diego, Ventura, San Bernardino, Los Angeles, San Luis Obispo, Orange

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