Common Name: fern bush, desert sweet

Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Shrub

General: More-or-less evergreen shrub, 1-3 m (3-10 ft) tall; stems densely branched; twigs and herbage glandular, stellate- pubescent; aromatic.

Leaves: Alternate, fern-like, oblong to lanceolate in outline, 2- 7 cm long, twice pinnate or with pinnatafid leaflets, pinnae in 8-24 pairs, the ultimate divisions about 1 mm long, sticky, glandular, stellate pubescent.

Flowers: Inflorescence a panicle, 3-15 cm long, densely glandular; sepals 5, 3-5 mm long, green, persistent; petals 5, broadly ovate to somewhat round, 2.5-5 mm, white.

Fruits: Follicle, 5-6.7 mm long; seeds few, 2-3 mm long.

Ecology: Found on dry, rocky slopes, washes, plains, pi-on-juniper woodlands, ponderosa pine forests from 4,500-8,000 ft (1372-2438 m), flowers July-November.

Distribution: Navajo, Coconino, Mohave, and Yavapai counties; western U.S.

Notes: This species makes an attractive ornamental. It is a host plant for the spring azure butterfly.

Ethnobotany: The Navajo smoke the leaves rolled in corn husks for good luck in hunting, and use the plant as feed for sheep and goats.

Editor: Springer et al. 2011