Purshia stansburiana
Common name:
Cliffrose
Pronunciation:
poor-SHE-ah stans-BUR-i-ana
Family:
Rosaceae
Genus:
Synonyms:
Cowania stansburiana
Purshia mexicana var. stansburyana
Cowania mexicana var. stansburiana
Type:
Broadleaf
Native to (or naturalized in) Oregon:
No
- Broadleaf deciduous or nearly evergreen shrub or small tree, up to 10 ft (3 m) tall and a similar width, much branched with a rounded crown. Leaves are simple, generally alternate (but typically clustered at nodes), wedge-shaped with 3 or as many as 9 lobes, 6 mm to 25 mm long, thickened, green to gray-green above and dotted with white glands, paler below. Flowers are white to pale yellow, fragrant, 2.5 cm across, 5 petals, yellow center, occur at ends of small side branches; bloom occurs from spring to early summer or later. Fruit, 5-10 achenes per flower, each tipped with a long, hairy, and twisted style.
- Hardy to USDA Zone 4 Native to southern Idaho, southwestern Colorado, Utah, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico and southern California and northern Mexico.
- stansburiana: honors Captain Howard Stansbury (1806-1863) an American topographical engineer and plant explorer who collected the type specimen in the Great Salt Lake Valley in Utah. John Torrey (1796-1873) described the specimen as Cowania stansburiana W.L Jepsen classified it as a var. of Cowania mexicana, i.e., Cowania mexicana var. stansburiana. It has been reclassified as Purshia stansburiana (Torr.) Hendrickson. The evergreen species were treated separately in the genus Cowania in the past; this genus is still accepted by some botanists. The Intigrated Taxonomic Informaton System (ITIS) lists the accepted name of Purshia stansburyana as a variety of Purshia mexicana, hence Purshia mexicana var. stansburyana.
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