Duration: Annual

Nativity: Native

Lifeform: Forb/Herb

General: Annual forb with decumbent and branched or erect and simple stem less than 60 cm tall, from a rosette with dense spreading hairs.

Leaves: Cauline, narrowly elliptic-lanceolate, minutely dentate, subsessile, 10-120 mm, leafy throughout.

Flowers: Axillary to nearly all leaves, nodding, with hypanthium 1.2-2 mm long; sepals 1-2.5 mm; petals 1.5-4.5 mm, yellow fading reddish, bases with 1-2 red dots.

Fruits: Capsule 13-25 mm long, 1.1-1.8 mm wide, stout, cylindric, when dry it is 4-angled, straight to 1-coiled.

Ecology: Found in sandy soils and along washes below 4,500 ft (1372 m); flowers March-May.

Notes: This species is distinguished by its cinereous-puberulent leaves and the fruit that is attenuately beaked. Yet again, the systematics of Camissonia are uncertain, as Plants DB and Jepson both do not indicate this species in Arizona. SEINET lists over fifty collections of this species in Arizona, spread throughout the central part of the state. Again, this species is worth collecting to broaden our understanding of its distribution. Another similar species to be on the look out for is Camissonia pallida subsp. pallida, previously considered another variety of C. micrantha, the former species also has many collections thoughout central Arizona.

Ethnobotany: Unknown, but other species in the genera have uses.

Etymology: Camissonia is named for Ludolf Karl Adelbert von Chamisso (1781-1838), a German botanist, while micrantha means small-flowered.

Synonyms: Oenothera micrantha var. exfoliata

Editor: SBuckley, 2010

Notes: Leaves cinereous-puberulent.Fruit is attenuately beaked

References: Kearney & Peebles; Arizona Flora. McDougall; Seed plants of Northern Arizona. Hickman, ed.; The Jepson Manual. ASU specimans