WILDFLOWERS OF NEW MEXICO

Densely hairy throughout, this showy plant has red stems 8–20-inches tall and clusters of 3 nodding red, urn-shaped flowers. Note the deeply dissected, fern-like basal leaves and single pair of opposite, smaller leaves about mid-stem.

FLOWERS: May–July. Clusters of 3(+) flowers on long, nodding pedicels; 5 white to reddish, rounded petals barely longer that the sepals; leaf-like bracts grow at base of pedicels and 5 narrow, spreading bractlets at base of flower. Fruit an erect cluster of feathery plumes dispersed by wind.

LEAVES: Basal and opposite on stem. Blades 2–8–inches long (5–20 cm), pinnate with 5–10 pairs of wedge-shaped leaflets cut about 1/2 way to midrib. Stem has one pair of leaves, mid-stem, opposite, much smaller.

HABITAT: Moist sandy, gravelly loam, meadows, stream sides, roadsides; ponderosa, Douglas fir, spruce-fir forests.

ELEVATION: 7,300–9,600 feet.

RANGE: Rocky Mts. and all states west, east to Great Lakes.

SIMILAR SPECIES: Purple (Water) Avens, G. rivale, in the Jemez and Sangre de Cristo mountains of northern NM, has nodding flowers with reddish petals that extend noticeably beyond the sepals, several alternate leaves along the flowering stem, and seedheads with hooked, not feathery, styles.

NM COUNTIES: Northern and western NM in mid- to high-elevation, moist habitats: Catron, Colfax, Los Alamos, McKinley, Rio Arriba, San Juan, Sandoval, Sierra, Taos.