spike

Showing 1–12 of 43 results

  • Aconitum columbianum / monkshood

    • brilliant blue/purple - ish; mixed colors or white
    • petal-like sepals form the hood
    • palmate, deeply-lobed & toothed leaves

  • Agastache urticifolia / western horsemint

    • short or tall flower heads ranging from pale to deep purple
    • square stems, opposite leaves
    • minty aroma
    • common along trails, especially in sun

  • Agropyron cristatum / crested wheatgrass

    • cool season grass growing in dense tufts
    • easily recognized by planar spike
    • spikelets overlap and are angled with respect to the stem
    • common

  • Amaranthus retroflexus / pigweed

    • green bottle-brush inflorescence
    • accomplished weed on disturbed sites (including road & driveway cracks)
    • often in gardens, farm fields (edges), roadsides

  • Artemisia cana / silver sagebrush

    • Low perennial, silvery shrub
    • Highly aromatic, like sagebrush
    • Entire leaves - no lobes
    • Nondescript, inconspicuous flowers in small clusters with leaf-like bracts
    • Grows in more moist habitat than other Artemisia spp.

  • Artemisia rigida / stiff sagebrush

    • low growing deciduous shrub
    • short, 3-5 lobed, grey leaves (hairy)
    • mild to pungently aromatic leaves
    • brittle branches up to 16 inches long

  • Artemisia tripartita / threetip sagebrush

    • evergreen shrub; branches in broom-like clusters
    • all parts covered with silvery/grey-green glandular hairs
    • leaves long and very deeply, very distinctly 3-lobed
    • flowers in spikes/racemes - all bits teeny, overall yellow-ish/reddish
    • often with mountain big sagebrush on nutrient poor soils

  • Bassia scoparia / burningbush

    • large, annual herb (forb)
    • leaves long-ish and narrow
    • inflorescence a highly branched spike with teeny green/yellow flowers
    • may form huge, invasive colonies
    • whole plant turns red in fall
    • a tumbleweed
    • especially in disturbed areas and wastelands in the Valley

  • Camassia quamash / small camas

    • immediately visible for its star-shaped blue flowers and yellow anthers
    • flowers borne on a spike-like raceme, opening from the bottom up
    • multiple flowers open at one time
    • leaves are grass-like, growing from a bulb
    • large seed capsules with ca. 30 roundish black seeds, ripe in late summer

  • Castilleja linariifolia / Wyoming Indian paintbrush

    • generally taller than most paintbrushes (up to 3 feet)
    • very thin leaves, seldom lobed, seldom hairy
    • red inflorescence bracts, may be lobed
    • flowers extend well beyond bracts
    • calyx is red and shorter than the corolla which is greenish yellow
    • rocky areas with sagebrush and conifer forests

  • Castilleja spp. / paintbrushes

    • vibrant, red (or yellow) inflorescence (bracts)
    • widespread, but confusing... five or more species in the area

  • Castilleja spp. / two yellow paintbrushes

    • look like Indian paintbrushes (which they are), but yellow
    • inflorescence bracts possibly lobed
    • height ranges from less than 8" to about 15"
    • subalpine, alpine and tundra habitats, in clumps or spread out
    • linear leaves without lobes, 3 prominent veins
    • red to maroon, hairy stems

Showing 1–12 of 43 results