WILDFLOWERS OF NEW MEXICO

The ends of soft-hairy stems 6–12-inches tall are crowded with clusters of yellow, trumpet-shaped flowers. Note the crinkly-fringed, petal-like lobes and the narrow leaves.

FLOWER: April–June. Fused petals form a 1/2–1 3/8-inch long (12–35 mm) tube that opens into a 1/2–3/4-inch wide (12–20 mm) flat star with 5 crinkly lobes with ragged edges. The showy flowers are mostly infertile, while later in the season inconspicuous, self-fertilizing flowers along the stem produce numerous seeds.

LEAVES: Basal leaves whither by flowering, stem leaves alternate. Blades linear to oblong, 1–3-inches long (2.5–7.5 cm), 1/4-inch wide (6 mm), stemless (sessile), margins entire.

HABITAT: Sandy, gravelly soils, flood plains, fields, roadsides; desert grasslands and scrub, pinyon-juniper, ponderosa-Douglas fir forests.

ELEVATION: 3,500–8,500 feet.

RANGE: AZ, CO, NM, NV, OK, UT, TX, WY; west of Mississippi River to Rocky Mt. states.

SIMILAR SPECIES: The flowers of Many-flowered Puccoon, L. multiflorum, statewide, have smooth, oval lobes. Smooth-throat Stoneseed, L. cobrense, in cent. and so. mountains, has stem leaves with long hairs, and pale-yellow, funnel-shaped flowers with rounded lobes as wide as the tube is long.

NM COUNTIES: Nearly statewide (not reported i n Mora or Valencia cos.) in low- to mid-elevation dry habitats.