Duration: Perennial

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Forb/Herb, Subshrub

General: Caespitose perennial herb, 5-30 cm tall, from a woody taproot and caudex, the caudex often branching; stems few to several, unbranched, spreading-hispid.

Leaves: Mostly in basal tufts, with a few alternate on the stems, sessile; blades oblanceolate to spatulate, 2-7 cm long and 4-12 mm wide, silvery strigose, the stem leaves also spreading-hispid.

Flowers: White and yellow, on 1-8 cm pedicels in narrow-cylindric or occasionally sub-capitate panicles, 3-19 cm long; calyx 5-lobed, 4-6 mm long in flower, elongating to 9-13 mm in fruit, the lobes linear, hispid to strigose with tawny or rarely silvery bristles; corolla salverform, the tube white or pale yellow and surpassing the calyx, the limb white, 6-9 mm wide, reflexed after anthesis, the throat yellow; flowers heterostylic.

Fruits: Nutlets usually 1 per calyx (sometimes 2), lance-ovate, 3-4 mm long, both surfaces covered with pointy bumps (muricate), the murications often tipped with sharp hairs.

Ecology: Found on shales, clayey sands, sandstone and gypsum, in pinyon-juniper woodland, sagebrush, and desert scrub, from 5,000-7,000 ft (1524-2134 m); flowers April-June.

Distribution: AZ, UT, NM, and CO

Ethnobotany: The Navajo give a decoction of plants at childbirth; also used to treat snakebite, toothaches, coughs and colds.

Etymology: Cryptantha comes from the Greek krypto, "hidden," and anthos, "flower," a reference to the first described species in the genus which has inconspicuous flowers that self-fertilize without opening; fulvocanescens translates to "yellow hairs."

Synonyms: Krynitzkia echinoides, Eritrichium glomeratum var. fulvocanescens, Oreocarya fulvocanescens

Editor: AHazelton 2015, AHazelton 2017