Salt Heliotrope (Heliotropium curassavicum var. oculatum) is a perennial herb that often creeps along the side of trails. As far as I can see, we only have the variety oculatum here. It is generally quite low-growing; when it gets half a meter (1.5 feet) high, it is already exceptionally tall. I’ve observed it from May into August. This makes it one of the “summer joys” of San Diego County, when it adds little splashes of color and green to an otherwise drying landscape.
Plant Tag: Boraginaceae
Nemophila menziesii var. menziesii
Common name: Baby Blue Eyes
This is the “companion” plant portrait to Nemophila menziesii var. integrifolia, hopefully showing nicely just how much the two varieties of this species differ, with regards to size and coloration of the flowers, and perhaps most of all the leaves. Because as mentioned in the other portrait: only seeing one of the two, it puzzled me how they’d be just a variety of one and the same species! :)
Nemophila menziesii var. integrifolia
The Baby Blue Eyes have long puzzled me. The photos that I found online didn’t really match what I saw with my own eyes. More specifically, most of the flowers that I saw here in San Diego County where much smaller, and looked different. Yet people told me: yes, those are Baby Blue Eyes.
Eriodictyon crassifolium
Common name: Thick-Leaf or Felt-Leaf Yerba Santa
Photographic plant portrait for Eriodictyon crassifolium aka Thick-Leaf or Felt-Leaf Yerba Santa, a tall shrub in the chaparral and sage scrub plant communities.
Pholistoma auritum var. auritum
Common name: Blue Fiestaflower
Here in inland north county of San Diego (Rancho Bernardo), I find Pholistoma auritum var. auritum blooming most reliably in somewhat shaded areas that are not getting too much direct sun exposure.