Plants

• Main Author: G. Calycosa Griseb
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: wild. Should not be attempted; Pacific; Subarctic
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.218.5034; http://www.fs.fed.us/pnw/pubs/gtr513/gtr513d.pdf

United States; annual or perennial herb; simple stems; fleshy roots or slender rhizomes; opposite, occasionally whorled, often clasping leaves; inflorescence compact cyme or solitary flowers, bell or funnel shaped, four or five lobed corollas, blue, violet purple, greenish, yellow, red or white; capsule, two valved, many seeded. Gentiana sceptrum, 25-100 cm, leaves 10 to 15, 3-6 cm, blue 3-4.5 cm flowers; G. calycosa, 5-30 cm. Range and distribution: Temperate to subarctic and alpine America and Eurasia. Gentiana sceptrum: from British Columbia to California, western slope of Cascade Range to coast; G. calycosa: also to Rocky Mountains. Widespread and common for some species; others locally abundant. Associations: Sitka spruce, western hemlock, Pacific silver fir zones. Western redcedar, alder, willow, black cottonwood, and bog or moist meadow. Gentiana calycosa: mountain heather, black huckleberry, broadleaf lupine, and showy sedge. Habitat: Meadows; G. calycosa, moist open sites in mountains; other gentian species including G. sceptrum, lower foothills and near coast. Successional stage: Component of well-developed, stable plant communities. Shade intolerant. Ecological relations: Deer and elk have been known to browse. Gentiana calycosa