This aggressive import from the Mediterranean region with its showy flowers escaped genteel gardens and spread across North America. Note the 1–3 foot tall stems topped with spikes of tubular, creamy-yellow flowers with petal-like lobes, a bulging dark-yellow center, and a long rear spur. It, and its look-alike companion in crime Dalmatian Toadflax, L. dalmatica, are widely established in the Rocky Mountain states and westward. Both spread by rhizomes to form dense colonies.

FLOWER: June–September. Spike-like clusters 3–6 inches long are crowded with pale-yellow, tubular flowers, 3/4–1 3/8 inches long (20-35 mm); the upper lip has 2 erect lobes and the lower lip has lobes folded downward with an showy dark yellow ridge (palate) projecting from the center; a long, narrow spur from the base contains the nectar glands. Fruit is a capsule with seeds with papery wings for wind dispersal.

LEAVES: Alternate, opposite, or whorled crowded on stem. Blades narrow, linear, 3/16 inch wide (4 mm) and 3/4–4 inches long (2–10 cm).

HABITAT: Sandy, gravelly, loamy soils; riparian areas, mountain slopes, meadows, roadsides, disturbed sites; bosque forests, sagebrush plains, pinyon-juniper woodlands, pine-oak, fir-aspen forests.

ELEVATION: 4,800–9,300 feet.

RANGE: All states west of the Mississippi River, especially Rocky Mountains and west; Great Lakes and northeast states.

SIMILAR SPECIES: The equally widespread Dalmatian Toadflax, L. dalmatica, has broad, clasping leaves, and bright yellow flowers.

NM COUNTIES: Mostly northern NM in mid- to high-elevation, disturbed habitats: Bernalillo, Colfax, Lincoln, Los Alamos, Otero, Rio Arriba, San Juan, San Miguel, Sandoval, Santa Fe, Taos, Torrance.