Eremothera chamaenerioides is a small herb with an erect, red stem. The lanceolate leaves are marked with red dots. While the basal leaves are present and the stem is short, the plant resembles Oenothera primiveris subsp. primiveris with which it grows. However, the flowers of Eremothera chamaenerioides are minute compared to those of Oenothera primiversi subsp. primiveris. Eremothera chamaenerioides grows in lower elevation arid areas in sandy, rocky soil.
Duration: Annual
Nativity: Native
Lifeform: Forb/Herb
General: Erect annual with slender stem, 10-50 cm tall with glandular hairs and small coarse non-glandular hairs near inflorescence, reddish.
Leaves: Basal and cauline, thin, 1.5-7 cm long by 1-15 mm wide, green to reddish with dark red spots, blades more or less elliptic, entire to sparsely and shallowly toothed or crenulate.
Flowers: Racemose inflorescence to 20 cm long in fruit, narrowly funnelform hypanthium, cream-white inside, pink outside 2-2.5 mm, whitish, often with broad pink midstripe or markings, turning pink with age; flowers open near sunset.
Fruits: Linear capsule, terete in cross section .5-.8 mm in diameter, 2.5-5 cm long, divariacate-spreading, glabrous and beakless at apex.
Ecology: Found on arid hills and plains below 5,500 ft (1676 m); flowers February-June.
Notes: Smallest flowered evening primrose in the Sonoran Desert region. Widespread. Pay attention to the small spots on the leaves, often quite variable in shape.
Ethnobotany: Unknown, but other species in the genera have medicinal and culinary uses.
Etymology: Camissonia is named for Ludolf Karl Adelbert von Chamisso (1781-1838) a German botanist, chamaenerioides is from root chamai, low-growing, dwarf added to something that looks like the genus Nerium.
Synonyms: Camissonia chamaenerioides, Oenothera chamaenerioides
Editor: SBuckley, 2010
Plant: Annual forb to 40 cm; herbage dark reddish brown; stems slender
Leaves: leaves alternate and reduced upwards, reddish with dark spots, blades elliptic
Flowers: flowers tubular, 4-merous, petals pink-white
Fruit: a linear capsule.
Notes: leaves and stems with red spots; flowers open in evening
References: J.C. Hickman, ed. The Jepson Manual.W.B. McDougall. Seed plants of Northern Arizona.ASU specimens.
