The photo at right
shows yellow owl-clover as seen at Arsenic Meadows at the eastern edge of the
Bob Marshall Wilderness in Montana........July 24, 1999. Note the linear-lanceolate
stem leaves.
Yellow owl-clover is an attractive annual wildflower with slender, erect, simple or sparsely-branched stems from 10-35 cm high. The leaves are all on the stems and are narrowly linear-lanceolate in shape with entire margins. They are 1.5-3.5 cm long.
The inflorescence is narrow and loose below, and about 10 cm long. The bracts are shorter an wider than the leaves and 3-parted, the lobes arising near the base of the bract. The lower bracts are 2.5-3 cm long, the upper are much shorter. The calyx is 6-8 mm long and equally cleft about one third of its length. The deep yellow corolla is 9-12 mm long, the tube gradually widening to the funnel-like throat. The upper lip is 2-4 mm long and is short in broad in outline. The lower lip is slightly expanded and about the same length as the upper lip.
Yellow owl-clover may be found in open grassy to sagebrush meadows and open stands of aspen.
Yellow owl-clover may be found from British Columbia south to the east of the Cascade Mts. to Mono and Fresno Counties in California and east Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, Colorado and northern New Mexico.
- 
- 
- 
