Plant Species: Collomia grandiflora, large-flowered collomia
Kingdom: Plantae
Phylum: Magnoliophyta -- flowering plants
Class: Magnoliopsida -- dicots
Order: Solanales
Family: Polemoniaceae -- phlox
Genus: Collomia
Species: grandiflora
Variety:
Common Name: large-flowered collomia, grand collomia
Species Code: COGR4
Origin: Native to dry, open areas from shrub-steppe to open coniferous forest over much of western temperate North America west of the Continental Divide.
Rare: no
Form: forb, annual, erect, to 100 cm tall, finely puberulent, becoming glandular pubescent above, taprooted.
Duration: annual
Longevity: annual
Habitat Type: prairie
Wetland Indicator Status: not listed
Leaves: mostly alternate, lanceolate or linear, sessile, entire, 1-7 cm long, glabrous above, glaucous and slightly glandular beneath; leaves subtending the inflorescence generally wider than the rest.
Mature height: 6-18 inches
Flowers: borne terminally in a dense cluster; calyx viscid-villous, lobes triangular, up to 4 mm long at flowering, longer in fruit; corolla salmon colored or yellowish, tube 20-30 mm long, slender and flaring to 5 lobes.
Flowers color: orange
Bloom: June, July
Bloom starts on: late June
Bloom ends on: late July
Fruit: capsule, 5-6 mm long; seeds 3-3.5 mm, elliptic oblong, furrowed, brown, mucilaginous when wet.
Vegetation type:
Characteristics:
C. grandiflora diffusa in Piper & Beattie 1914.
Reproduces by seed, which is expelled explosively.
Taprooted annual.
146,986 seeds/lb (USDA NRCS Pullman PMC 2005).
n=8.
Pollinated by bee flies (Bombyliidae) and Megachilid bees (Wilken 1982).
Flowers are perfect.
Some native peoples used the plants medicinally.
Fruit is a capsule.
Produces both cleistogamous and chasmogamous flowers in the same inflorescence (Wilken 1982, Ellstrand et al 1984, Lord & Eckard 1984, Mintner & Lord 1983).
Both cleistogamous and chasmogamous flowers are self compatible but not compatible with each other (Lord & Eckard 1984). Chasmogamous flowers may be autogamous or xenogamous (Wilken 1982).
Comments:
Sun requirement: full
Soil moisture: xeric to mesic
Precipitation:
Fire:
Hazards:
Sowing time: fall
Transplant time: early spring
Stratification: none
Seed yield: high
Seed harvest: medium difficulty
Seed first harvest: annual
Seed cleaning: easy
Planting duration: annual
Seed insect problem: none noted
Seed shatter: high
Seed size: medium
Seed harvest date: Aug
Seed comments: expels seed explosively when ripe, indeterminate
Key words: annual upland
Alternate Genus:
Alternate Species:
Alternate Variety:
Propagation:
2 protocols in the Native Plant Network
Corvallis OR Plant Materials Center
Pullman WA Plant Materials Center
Other Propagation Information
Unpublished data from the USDA NRCS Pullman Plant Materials Center shows that seeds germinate at high rates under cool temperatures. Germination decreases as temperature increases.
Reproduces by seed.
Notes: Collomia grandiflora flowers are quite striking. They have a unique color that one rarely sees in anything else. Plants growing under low levels of competition grow quite large and bloom for a long time. Seeds are expelled explosively, so it can move around rapidly. It is an annual which can be sown in spring, usually does better with fall seeding. Common name is large-flowered collomia (Skinner et al 2005).
References:
Ellstrand, N.C., E.M. Lord, and K.J. Eckard. 1984. The Inflorescence as a Metapopulation of Flowers: Position-Dependent Differences in Function and Form in the Cleistogamous Species
Collomia grandiflora Dougl. ex Lindl. (Polemoniaceae). Botanical Gazette 145:329-333.
Hsiao, Yi-Chun, and T.I. Chuang. 1981. Seed Coat Morphology and Anatomy in Collomia (Polemoniaceae). American Journal of Botany 68:1155-1164.
Lord, E.M., and K.J. Eckard. 1984. Incompatibility Between the Dimorphic Flowers of Collomia grandiflora, a Cleistogamous Species. Science 223(4637):695-696.
Lord, E.M., K.J. Eckard, and W. Crone. 1989. Development of the Dimorphic Anthers in Collomia grandiflora: Evidence for Heterochrony in the Evolution of the Cleistogamous Anther. Journal of Evolutionary Biology 2:81-93.
Minter, T.C., and E.M. Lord. 1983. A Comparison of Cleistogamous and Chasmogamous Floral Development in Collomia grandiflora Dougl. ex Lindl. (Polemoniaceae). American Journal of Botany 70:1499-1508.
Piper, C.V., and R.K. Beattie. 1914. The Flora of Southeastern Washington and Adjacent Idaho. Lancaster, PA: Press of the New Era Printing Company. 296 pp.
Skinner, David M., Paul Warnick, Bill French, and Mary Fauci. 2005.
Characteristics and Uses of Native Palouse Forbs in Landscaping.
USDA NRCS Pullman Plant Materials Center and Palouse Prairie Foundation.
Online at http://www.wsu.edu/pmc_nrcs/Docs/Forbs_for_Landscaping.pdf
USDA NRCS. 2009. The PLANTS Database (http://plants.usda.gov, 2 August 2009). National Plant Data Center, Baton Rouge, LA 70874-4490 USA.
Wilken, Dieter H. 1982. The Balance Between Chasmogamy and Cleistogamy in Collomia grandiflora (Polemoniaceae). American Journal of Botany 69:1326-1333.