WILDFLOWERS OF NEW MEXICO

A basal rosette of fern-like leaves surrounds a stout stem to 30-inches tall, hairless, and tipped with a dense spike of small, reddish-purple flowers. Note the flowers are distinctly shaped like tiny elephant heads. Favors wet soils and can blanked moist meadows.

FLOWER: June–September. Each pink to reddish-purple flower, 3/8–5/8-inch long (10–15 mm), has a rounded hood that faces downward with a slender beak that curves upward like the trunk of an elephant, and a lower lip with two side lobes resembling elephant ears.

LEAVES: Basal rosette, alternate on stem. Blades to 10-inches long (25 cm), lance-shaped, fern-like, midrib lined with oblong to tooth-like lobes.

HABITAT: Moist sandy, gravelly soils, meadows, streamsides, bogs; spruce forests, subalpine meadows.

ELEVATION: 8,500–11,800 feet.

RANGE: AZ, CA, CO, ID, MT, NM, NV, OR, UT, WA, WY.

SIMILAR SPECIES: The rosette of fern-like leaves, tall bloom spite, and beaked flowers distinguish this species.

NM COUNTIES: Northern NM mountains in high-elevation, moist habitats: Colfax, Mora, San Miguel, Santa Fe, Rio Arriba, Taos.