Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center


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Western Wetland Flora

Field Office Guide to Plant Species

Dark-throat Shooting-star
Dodecatheon pauciflorum Greene

JPG -- Species Photo JPG -- Distribution Map

Family: Primrose (Primulaceae)
Flowering: May-July
Field Marks: This species has leaves up to 8 inches long, 5-15 flowers per stem, and the tube of the sepals up to 1/6 inch long.
Habitat: Wet meadows.
Habit: Perennial herb with a short crown and fleshy roots.
Stems: Underground as a short crown.
Leaves: All basal, oblanceolate to elliptic, up to 8 inches long, rounded or pointed at the tip, tapering to a short stalk, without teeth, or sometimes with a wavy edge, smooth.
Flowers: 5-15 per stem, nodding, the cluster subtended by very small bracts.
Sepals: 5, green, united below, the tube up to 1/6 inch long, the lobes longer than the tube.
Petals: 5, united at the base, turned backward, purple, up to 3/4 inch long.
Stamens: 5.
Pistils: Ovary superior.
Fruits: Capsule oblong-ovoid, smooth, up to 3/4 inch long.
Notes: This species is often combined with D. pulchellum.

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Return to Species List -- Group 8
Next Species -- Few-flower Shooting-star (Dodecatheon pulchellum)

U.S. Department of the Interior | U.S. Geological Survey
URL: http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/plants/florawe/species/8/dodepauc.htm
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Page Last Modified: Saturday, 02-Feb-2013 06:27:53 EST
Reston, VA [vaww54]