Grand Canyon: Flora

We had fun spotting flowers around the Grand Canyon. There was quite a variety of types and colors and especially as the week went on, we enjoyed finding ones we hadn't seen yet.

I'll start with the Mexican cliffrose (Purshia mexicana) you saw in the last post. They are large shrubs covered in these delicate yellow flowers. There was a section of the rim, west of the village, along Hermit's Road, where there were so many of them that you could smell them in the air as you walked or biked along the trail.

Another shrub with distinctive flowers was the cliff fendlerbush (Fendlera rupicola). It has four white petals with large gaps between them, looking a bit like a Coptic cross or a compass rose.

I think this trumpet-shaped flower is an Arizona firecracker (Ipomopsis arizonica),  but it could also be the closely related skyrocket or scarlet gilia (Ipomopsis aggregata). 

This light bluish-purply flower with darker veins is called blue flax or Lewis flax (Linum lewisii).

At first I thought the flower below was another species, given the apparently more distinct petals and the different appearance of the foliage. But I think they are, in fact, the same species, just at slightly different stages.

I love the common name of this subtle little bloom: Miner's Lettuce. Scientific name: Claytonia perfoliata. 

This delicate little flower is a bush pea (Lathyrus brachycalyx). 

This desert phlox (Phlox austromontana) looks very similar to other species and varieties of phlox I've seen around the country.

 My best guess for this one is a toadflax penstemon (Penstemon linarioides). What a name, huh?

This pretty orange flower is some sort of globemallow (genus Sphaeralcea). 

I'm least sure about this one. The petals look like a desert marigold (Baileya multiradiata), with the three-pronged ruffled edges, but the center looks too small proportionally, and there don't seem to be enough petals. But I don't have any other good candidates either, so I'm a bit stymied.

Here's the brilliant and iconic Indian paintbrush. Although I'm again unsure of the species, my best guess is Castilleja chromosa, the desert Indian paintbrush.

We saw many blooming agave plants, often just a little ways into the canyon.

I've always had a special affection for prickly pears (I blame the Jungle Book), but I didn't realize until I moved to Arizona just how many species of prickly pears (genus Opuntia) there are. They also hybridize, making them even more difficult to identify. Most of the prickly pear blooms are yellow, but some are orange or red, like these.

Here you can see on the newer pads, along with the spines there are tiny fleshy leaves. You can also see several buds in the background.

Fauna up next!