Collomia Nutt.
C. tinctoria Kellogg. [[Fig. 2.]]
Fig. 2.
Stem erect, slender, one to three inches in height (often so minute as to appear almost stemless) villous and pulvurently viscid glandular throughout. Leaves opposite, lower pair oblong-spatulate obtuse, lamina slightly decurrent down the petioles; those above, lanceolate, petiolate, acute, or acuminate, mucronate, one-nerved, quite entire.
The minute yellow flowers crowded at the summit in pairs, from the axils of the much abbreviated branchlets, short, pedicellate; and with the long, narrowly lanceolate, acuminate, bractoid leaves aggregated into a somewhat dense, subsessile head. Calyx obconic, membranaceously diaphanous at the base; segments green, cup prismatic (or pentangular); also with five prominent processes, or folds, at the clefts, the semi-lanced segments acute, or acuminate, subulate pointed, three-nerved.
The filiform flowers twice the length of the calyx, border spreading, tube contracted below, stamens equal, or sub-equal, inserted into the throat; capsule obovate, emarginate.
A very diminutive species from the western slope of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, found by Mr. Herbert C. Dorr. The plant yields a beautiful yellow dye, hence the specific name.
C. micrantha Kellogg. [[Fig. 3.]]
