Styrax redivivus

Styrax redivivus, with common names that include snowdrop bush, California styrax, bitternut,[1] drug snowbell,[2] and chaparral snowbell,[3] is a species of flowering plant in the family Styracaceae. It is a rare plant, native to California,[1][3] a shrub which can grow to 4 metres (13 ft) in height.[1]

Styrax redivivus
Close-up of flowers.

Imperiled  (NatureServe)
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Asterids
Order: Ericales
Family: Styracaceae
Genus: Styrax
Species:
S. redivivus
Binomial name
Styrax redivivus
Synonyms[1]
  • Darlingtonia rediviva Torr.
  • Styrax californicus Torr.
  • Styrax californicus var. fulvescens Eastwood
  • Styrax officinalis var. californicus (Torr.) Rehder
  • Styrax officinalis var. fulvescens (Eastwood) Munz & I. M. Johnston

Description

Styrax redivivus is a deciduous shrub, usually 1–3 m tall, with alternate roundish softly hairy leaves that are 2–7 cm long and nearly as wide. The numerous white flowers are borne in small showy clusters at the tips of the twigs. They are 12–18 mm long with the petals joined only near the base, commonly 6 in number but ranging from 4 to 8. The fruit is globose, not very fleshy, 12–14 mm long.

Seeds.

Distribution

This tall attractive shrub flowers in spring and grows on dry bushy slopes at scattered localities from San Luis Obispo County to San Diego County. It is apparently absent from Santa Monica Mountains and all but the easternmost portion of the San Gabriel mountains. In the Sierra Nevada it is a shrub of lower elevations below 3000 feet on the western slopes from Tulare County north. It occurs in chaparral, foothills, woodland and yellow pine forest, usually in open rocky areas.[4][5][6]

References
  1. Peter W. Fritsch, "Styrax redivivus (Torrey) L. C. Wheeler, Bull. S. Calif. Acad. Sci. 44: 94. 1946", Flora of North America, vol. 8
  2. USDA, NRCS (n.d.). "Stryrax redivivus". The PLANTS Database (plants.usda.gov). Greensboro, North Carolina: National Plant Data Team. Retrieved 4 February 2016.
  3. Styrax rediviva The Nature Conservancy
  4. Native Shrubs of the Sierra Nevada by John Hunter Thomas and Dennis R. Parnell, University of California Press, Berkeley, California, 1974, ISBN 0-520-02538-5 (paperbound).
  5. Native Shrubs of Southern California by Peter H. Raven, University of California Press, Berkeley, Los Angeles, 1966, fourth printing 1982.
  6. Consortium of California Herbaria


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