Silene vulgaris

Bladder campion

Family: Caryophyllaceae · Type: perennial · Not Native

Bladder campion is a naturalized perennial herb found in California's Central Valley, San Francisco Bay Area, southern California coast, and Cascade Range in open areas and fields at elevations below 1,200 meters. Flowering from summer to fall, this plant produces white flowers with deeply notched petals in flat-topped clusters. Growing 20 to 80 centimeters tall with decumbent to erect stems that are glabrous or slightly glaucous, it has a short rhizome and few caudex branches. Its leaves gradually reduce in size upward, with lower leaves 4 to 8 centimeters long and 5 to 20 millimeters wide, lanceolate to oblanceolate, and upper leaves 3 to 4.5 centimeters long and 5 to 15 millimeters wide, lanceolate to ovate. The fruit is a nearly spherical capsule with a short 2 to 3 millimeter stalk, containing small black seeds.

Habitat: Open areas, fields

Bloom period: Summer-fall

Elevation: < 1200 m

Bioregions: CaR, GV, SnFrB, SCo, expected elsewhere

California counties: Siskiyou, Los Angeles, Orange, San Bernardino, Santa Clara, Placer, El Dorado, Nevada, Solano, Butte, Santa Cruz, Marin, Yolo, Trinity, Alameda

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