Field Book of Western Wild Flowers

by Margaret Armstrong; J. J. Thornber

Yellow Owl's Clover
Orthocàrpus lùteus
Yellow
Summer
West, etc.

This often makes patches of bright color. It is from six to twelve inches tall, with stiff, slender, hairy stems, hairy leaves, and pretty bright yellow flowers, nearly half an inch long. This grows in dry sunny places as far east as Colorado, reaching an altitude of ten thousand feet.

Johnny-Tuck—Orthocarpus erianthus.
Yellow Pelican Flower—O. faucibarbatus.

Escobita, Owl's Clover
Orthocàrpus densiflòrus
Purplish-pink
Spring
California

The Spanish name, which means "little broom," is very appropriate for this pretty plant. The stiff, downy stem is from five to fifteen inches tall and the downy leaves are light green and become tipped with purplish-pink as they mount up the stalk. The flowers are about three-quarters of an inch long and have a white lower lip, which is tipped with yellow and has a crimson dot on each lobe, and the straight, erect "beak" is crimson. The cluster is crowded with purplish-pink and white bracts and though the flowers themselves are not conspicuous the effect is feathery and very pretty, especially when the plants grow in such quantities as to color a whole field with soft pink, or when mixed with beautifully contrasting patches of blue Lupine. This is common along the coast. O. purpuráscens, common in the Northwest and Southwest, is similar, but it has a hairy "beak," hooked at the tip, and the general effect is handsomer and much brighter in color, but less feathery.

Owl's Clover
Orthocàrpus purpureo-álbus
Pink and White
Summer
Ariz., Utah, New Mex.

An interesting annual plant, quite pretty, about a foot high, the stem sometimes branching and the branches suggesting those of a candelabrum, clothed with soft, finely divided, dull green leaves and ending in spikes of green bracts and pretty little flowers, three-quarters of an inch long. The calyx is green, the upper lip of the corolla is purplish-pink and the lower lip is swollen, three-lobed and cream-white, turning pink in fading. This grows in dry places at altitudes of from six to eight thousand feet. Only one of the branches is given in the picture.

Owl's Clover
Orthocàrpus exsértus
White and pink
Spring, summer
California

A pretty little plant, from six to eight inches high, with hairy leaves cut into narrow divisions and passing into pinkish-lilac bracts towards the top of the stalk, which are mixed with pink and white flowers, each about an inch long, so that the effect of the whole is a spike of pink and white. The lower lip of the corolla is white and the upper lip is pink, with a furry tip. This grows in fields. O. attenuàtus, common in fields in the Northwest, is a slender inconspicuous kind, about nine inches tall, with soft, thin, dull green leaves, most of them not lobed, and pale green bracts, often tipped with white. The corollas are dull white, the lower lip dotted with purple or yellow, and the whole effect of the cluster is feathery, very slender, and pale in color.