WILDFLOWERS OF NEW MEXICO

Popular in water-wise landscapes, this 6–24-inch tall, bushy plant blazes with yellow flowers. Note the 4 large petals, disk-like stigma, style extended beyond the stamens, buds with distinct ridges, and narrow, linear leaves. Flowers open in the morning and bloom throughout the day.

FLOWER: March–August. A funnel-shaped floral tube 3/16–1/3-inch long (5–20 mm), opens 2-inches wide (5 cm) with 4 spreading, crinkly, yellow petals. The squarish, disk-like stigma always equals or extends beyond the pollen-bearing anthers to prevent self-pollination; stamens are 2 different lengths. Square flower buds with 4 keeled ridges crowd the ends of the stems.

LEAVES: Basal rosette usually absent at blooming. Stem leaves alternate. Blades linear, narrow, 1–3-inches long (2.5–7.5 cm), often folded along midrib, margins with small, rounded to irregular teeth.

HABITAT: Sandy, gravelly soils, roadsides, disturbed areas; desert grasslands and scrub, plains and prairies.

ELEVATION: 4,600–6,000 feet.

RANGE: CO, KS, LA, NM, OK, TX.

SIMILAR SPECIES: The look-alike Yellow Sundrops, O. serrulata, widespread in eastern NM and scattered elsewhere, also has square buds, but the stigma is always shorter than the anthers. Hartweg’s Sundrops, O. hartwegii, nearly statewide, has round, conical buds. The Calylophus species, which have club-shaped stigmas, are now lumped with Oenothera species, which have cross-shaped stigmas.

NM COUNTIES: Eastern, central, and western NM in low- to mid-elevation, dry habitats: Bernalillo, Catron, Chaves, Cibola, De Baca, Eddy, Grant, Lea, Lincoln, Luna, Quay, Roosevelt, San Juan, Santa Fe, Sierra, Socorro, Torrance.