With hairless stems reaching 3-feet tall, this slender mustard has loose clusters of small flowers with 4 spoon-shaped, rose-purple petals, and a few, scattered leaves along the stem. Note the petals have prominent veining, and the upper leaves are usually less than 1/4 inch wide and pointed.

FLOWER: April–September. Several flowers at a time bloom on a elongated, loose cluster (raceme) with 4 pale to reddish-purplish, spreading petals, 1/2–5/8-inch long (12–16 mm); sepals also purplish; seed pods erect, straight, thin, cylindrical, 1 5/8–3 1/2-inches long (4–9 cm).

LEAVES: Basal first year, fade by blooming; alternate on stem. Lower blades elliptic, upper leaves get smaller with narrow, linear blades 1 3/8–2 inches long (3.5–5 cm) by 1/4-inch wide (6 mm); margins entire, surfaces hairless, tip pointed.

HABITAT: Dry sandy, gravelly soils; plains, foothills, mesas, canyons, roadsides; desert grasslands and scrub, pinyon-juniper, ponderosa pine-Douglas fir-Gambel oak woodlands.

ELEVATION: 3,550–9,500 feet.

RANGE: AZ, CO, NM, TX.

SIMILAR SPECIES: The rose-purple flowers and tall stems distinguish this mustard.  Wright’s Thelypody,  Thelypodium wrighti, reaches 3–6-feet tall and has dense clusters of flowers with small, white, narrow petals. Western Wallflower, Erysimum capitatum, has a dense, rounded cluster of yellow to orange-red flowers.

NM COUNTIES: Widespread nearly statewide (not reported in Chaves, De Baca, Lea, Roosevelt counties) in low- to mid-elevation, dry habitats.