Common Name: POPPY FAMILY Habit: Annual to small tree; sap colorless, yellow, orange, red, or white. Leaf: basal, cauline, or both, simple and entire, toothed, or lobed, or 1--3-pinnate-dissected or compound; cauline generally alternate; stipules 0. Inflorescence: terminal, 1-flowered or cyme, raceme, or panicle; bracts generally present. Flower: bisexual, radial, bilateral, or biradial; sepals 2--3, shed after flower; petals generally 2 × sepals in number; stamens generally many; ovary 1, superior, chamber 1, style 0 or 1, stigmas or lobes 2--many, ovules few to many. Fruit: capsule, dehiscent by valves or pores, +- nut, or breaking transversely into 1-seeded, indehiscent units. Seed: fleshy appendage generally 0. Genera In Family: 25--30 genera, 200 species: northern temperate, northern tropics; some cultivated (Papaver, Eschscholzia, Hunnemannia), source of opiates. Note:Stylomecon moved to Papaver. Corydalis, Dicentra, Fumaria in Fumariaceae in FNANM, elsewhere. Glaucium flavum Crantz is a waif. According to FNANM (3:300--301), Hunnemannia fumariifolia Sweet (+- like Eschscholzia except sepals free) an occasional waif in California, but documentation evidently lacking. Fleshy appendage of seed sometimes for dispersal by ants. eFlora Treatment Author: Gary L. Hannan & Curtis Clark, except as noted Scientific Editor: Thomas J. Rosatti.
Habit: Annual, perennial herb; sap colorless or orange. Leaf: basal or basal and cauline, 1--4-pinnate-dissected, segments narrow. Inflorescence: cyme, 1--many-flowered. Flower: receptacle funnel-shaped, tip cupped around ovary base, outer receptacle rim occasionally spreading; sepals 2, fused, shed as unit at flower; petals generally 4 (except doubled flowers), free, obovate or wedge-shaped, generally yellow to orange (white or pink), shed after flower leaving crown-like membrane (inner receptacle rim); stamens 12--many, free; carpels 2, style 0, stigma lobes 4--8, spreading, linear. Fruit: oblong, dehiscent from base. Seed: many, 1--2 mm, round to ovate, net-ridged, prominent-discontinuous-ridged, or minutely pitted, tan, brown, or black. Etymology: (J.F.G. von Eschscholtz, Russian surgeon, botanist, 1793--1831)
Eschscholzia californica Cham.
NATIVE Habit: Annual (or perennial herb from heavy taproot), erect or spreading, 5--60 cm, glabrous, occasionally glaucous. Leaf: segments obtuse or acute. Flower: bud erect, acute to long-pointed, glabrous, occasionally glaucous; receptacle obconic, with spreading rim 0.5--5 mm; petals 20--60 mm, orange, or yellow, bases generally orange. Fruit: 3--9 cm. Seed: 1.5--1.8 mm wide, round to elliptic, net-ridged, brown to black. Chromosomes: 2n=12. Ecology: Grassy, open areas; Elevation: < 2500 m. Bioregional Distribution: CA-FP, MP, w SNE, DMoj; Distribution Outside California: to southern Washington, Nevada, New Mexico, northwestern Baja California. Naturalized in Argentina, Australia, Chile, Europe, and South Africa. Flowering Time: Feb--Sep Note: Highly variable, with > 90 taxa described; further study needed to determine if Eschscholzia californica subsp. mexicana (Greene) C. Clark (annual; cotyledons entire; DMtns), Eschscholzia procera Greene (pl large; southern SNF) deserve taxonomic recognition. Synonyms: Eschscholzia californica var. peninsularis Munz Jepson eFlora Author: Gary L. Hannan & Curtis Clark Index of California Plant Names (ICPN; linked via the Jepson Online Interchange) Previous taxon: Eschscholzia caespitosa Next taxon: Eschscholzia glyptosperma
Botanical illustration including Eschscholzia californica
Citation for this treatment: Gary L. Hannan & Curtis Clark 2012, Eschscholzia californica, in Jepson Flora Project (eds.) Jepson eFlora, https://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/eflora/eflora_display.php?tid=25206, accessed on September 30, 2023.
Citation for the whole project: Jepson Flora Project (eds.) 2023, Jepson eFlora, https://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/eflora/, accessed on September 30, 2023.
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