Viola purpurea subsp. quercetorum

Family: Violaceae · Type: perennial · Native

oak woodland violet is a California native perennial found in northwestern, Cascade Range, Sierra Nevada, central western, southwestern, and Modoc Plateau bioregions in dry, grassy or brushy slopes, chaparral, and areas below yellow-pine forest at elevations of 300 to 2,000 meters. Flowering from February to July, this plant produces yellow to purple flowers with lowest petals 10 to 16 millimeters long. Growing 4 to 25 centimeters tall with spreading to erect stems that elongate by season's end, it develops puberulent foliage. Its basal leaves are ovate to round, 1 to 5 centimeters long, gray-green with occasional purple tinting and irregularly wavy-toothed edges. The cauline leaves are smaller, lanceolate to diamond-shaped, with crenate-serrate margins and tapered bases.

Habitat: Dry, grassy or brushy slopes, chaparral, generally below yellow-pine forest

Bloom period: Feb-Jul

Elevation: 304-1981 m

Bioregions: NW, CaR, SN, CW, SW, MP

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

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