WILDFLOWERS OF NEW MEXICO

Reaching 10–18-inches tall, this branching, spreading plant favors sandy habitats. The delicate creamy-white flowers have a pale green, star-shaped pattern in the center. Note the narrow, linear leaves with lobed margins and scattered scruffy, not sticky, hairs.

FLOWER: May–September. Yellow to greenish-white with 5 fused petals that form a flat, 5-sided to roundish disk with a white star in the center with a green border. The fruit matures to a round 1/4–3/8-inch diameter berry enclosed in a papery sheath.

LEAVES: Alternate. Blades linear to lance-shaped, 3/4–2 1/2-inches long (2–6.5 cm), 1/8–3/8-inch wide (2–10 mm), with entire to lobed margins; surfaces sparsely covered with branched hairs without sticky glands.

HABITAT: Sandy, gravelly, clay, shale soils, roadsides, disturbed areas; desert grasslands and scrub, pinion-juniper woodlands.

ELEVATION: 4,000–7,400 feet.

RANGE: AZ, CA, CO, NM, OK, TX, UT.

SIMILAR SPECIES: 5 species in NM with look-alike flowers. Hairy False Nightshade, C. sordida, in the same range, is densely covered with unbranched, sticky-glandular hairs and has wrinkled leaves without lobes. Gray False Nightshade, C. coniodes, has leaves with numerous irregular lobes and unbranched hairs without sticky glands.

NM COUNTIES: Common in low- to mid-elevation, relatively moist habitats, statewide except Chaves, Curry, Guadalupe, Lea, Taos, Valencia.