Kansas Wildflowers and Grasses

STENOSIPHON

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Stenosiphon linifolius (Nutt. ex E. James) Heynh.

Russell County, Kansas

Biennial

Height: 2-9 feet

Family: Onagraceae - Evening Primrose Family

Flowering Period: July, August, September

Stems:

Erect, 1-3, slender, wiry-branched in inflorescence, waxy, usually glabrous to inflorescence, somewhat brittle.

Leaves:

Alternate, simple, sessile, lanceolate, 1 to 3 inches long, 1/4 to 3/4 inch wide, glabrous; margins entire, whitish; tips pointed; lower leaves often absent at flowering; upper leaves reduced, linear-lanceolate.

Inflorescences:

Spikes, elongate, terminal, glandular-hairy.

Flowers:

About 1/2 inch across, sessile; sepals 4, oblong-lanceolate, whitish, sparsely pubescent, bent abruptly backward; petals 4, less than 1/4 inch long, white, clawed, at end of threadlike floral tube; stamens 8, unequal; style as long or longer than stamens, stigma 4-lobed.

Fruits:

Capsules, nutlike, egg-shaped, conspicuously ribbed, pubescent, 1-seeded; seeds small, whitish yellow.

Habitat:

Dry, rocky, prairie hillsides, roadsides, stream valleys, and waste places, most abundant on limestone soils.

Distribution:

Throughout Kansas.

Comments:

Stenosiphon drops its leaves during periods of drought and conducts photosynthesis in the stem. A rosette of leaves develops in the fall of the first year, and the stem arises in the second year.

Stenosiphon inflorescence