Thamnosma montanum

Kearney and Peebles 1969, McDougall 1873

Duration: Perennial Nativity: Native Lifeform: Subshrub General: Shrubby, spinescent perennials, herbage yellowish, thickly gland-dotted. Leaves: Narrow, fleshy, gland-dotted, linear-spatulate, alternate, entire, few, early deciduous. Flowers: Dark blue, narrowly funnelform or urn-shaped, borne in small racemose or cymose clusters, style exserted. Fruits: Capsule deeply 2-lobed, the stipe of the capsule longer than the calyx. Seeds 4-6 mm long, smooth or somewhat wrinkled. Ecology: Found from 4,500 ft or below, on desert mesas and slopes, (1372 m); flowering February-April. Distribution: s UT, s NV, se CA, AZ; Sonora, and Baja Calif., MEX. Ethnobotany: Used as an emetic, for painful abdomen, taken as a laxative, for chest pains, colds, rubbed on open wounds, taken as a hallucinogen, as an aid in hunting, used to keep snakes away, used by women as a douche, smoked for colds, taken for smallpox, gonorrhea, and as a tonic. Etymology: Thamnosma is from the Greek for odorous shrub, while montana means mountain. Synonyms: None Editor: SBuckley 2010, LCrumbacher 2011